Or Die Trying: Cho Chang's Sixth Year
by dungeonwonk
Summary: A continuation of the Canon from Cho's point-of-view, begun under the pen-name "monkeymouse"--it's still me.
1. Chapter 25 Marietta's Story

OR DIE TRYING: CHO CHANG'S SIXTH YEAR  
  
By monkeymouse  
  
NB: JKRowling built the Potterverse; I'm just redecorating one of the rooms. And one of the great things about JKR telling the story from Harry's point of view is that stuff could be happening all over Hogwarts that Harry isn't aware of.  
  
Rated: PG  
  
Spoilers: Everything  
  
xxx  
  
25. Marietta's Story  
  
Cho pushed open the door of the hospital wing. Toward the far end of the ward she saw Madam Pomfrey and Professor Flitwick struggling with a student who was trying to get out of the bed.  
  
"We want to help you, honestly we do," Professor Flitwick was saying as he tried to grab hold of a flailing arm, "but you must co-operate!"  
  
Cho rushed to look at the student in the bed. It was Marietta. She was in her usual school robes and Prefect badge. but someone had thrown a towel over her face. Cho reached to pull away the towel.  
  
"What do you think you're doing..." Madam Pomfrey started indignantly.  
  
Cho had pulled off the towel.  
  
In any school full of children between the ages of eleven and eighteen, blemishes were likely to be a problem, even a source of amusement. Some of the Hogwarts students had escaped relatively unblemished (so to speak), and Cho was, so far, anyway, one of the lucky ones. She believed it was due partly to her mother drumming the idea of being careful about diet and cleanliness into her; Cho thought it was more a matter of being out playing Quidditch and getting enough sun on one's face.  
  
Other cases were far more dreadful. Some students would have large red patches of skin, which looked worst on those with pale skin and fair hair. Others would sport large white pimples in conspicuous places. Then there was Eloise Midgen the year before, who proved that a cure could be worse than the disease by trying to hex the pimples off her face. The pimples vanished, but so did the nose they were attached to. It took Madam Pomfrey several days to sort that one out. Cho found it amusing, but Cedric didn't, since Eloise was in Hufflepuff.  
  
But Marietta Edgecombe's acne seemed like an Old Testament curse. Much of the skin from her cheekbones to her jawline was inflamed, and not red but purple in colour. The mottled skin surrounded pimples that were open and weeping like infected sores. And, in what could only be called an act of vengeance, the pimples were arranged in lines like a connect-the-dots puzzle in the newspaper. Marietta's dots spelled out the word "SNEAK".  
  
Cho's heart broke. She knew exactly what Marietta had done to deserve this.  
  
"Cho!" Marietta shouted. "You have to help me! I don't understand any of this!"  
  
"We can't even begin to cure you until you tell us what happened!" Madam Pomfrey shouted.  
  
"I DON'T KNOW WHAT HAPPENED!" Marietta wailed.  
  
Cho grabbed onto Madam Pomfrey's arm. "Let me try talking to her. Please."  
  
Pomfrey eyed the girls suspiciously, then nodded. She motioned to Professor Flitwick, and they went to the other end of the ward.  
  
"Cho," Marietta sniffled, staring down at her hands, "you've got to help me. You've got to think of something. I think I'm going mad. They keep asking me about meetings. Six months of meetings, and I can't remember a single thing! Why?!"  
  
"Calm down," Cho said, taking hold of Marietta's hands. "Now," and she felt her stomach churn, "how did this happen?"  
  
"I don't know!" Marietta wailed again.  
  
Cho suddenly realized that she had completely reversed roles with Marietta: the Prefect who had comforted her through nightmare after nightmare was now trapped in one herself, and there was nobody but Cho to remain as her friend.  
  
Cho's grip on Marietta's hands grew tighter. "Tell me what you do know, then. Start after dinner. You said you weren't feeling well."  
  
"I said that? I guess I did; I sort of remember it, but I was making an excuse to you. I had to be somewhere else tonight."  
  
Cho's mouth was so dry she could barely ask, "Instead of where?"  
  
"Instead of... Instead of..." Marietta paused, with a queer look on her face; a moment later, she went on. "Well, in any case, I went to see Madam Umbridge. My mum said I had to talk to her about something; funny, I don't remember what now. Something she heard on the Floo Network. Anyway, I went there and..."  
  
Now Cho saw it: the glazed eyes, the loose jaw, the slightly bemused expression. It was the same as the Muggle who rented the Chang family their campsite for the World Quidditch Cup.  
  
Marietta had been given a Memory Modification.  
  
Within herself, Cho gave a sigh of relief. Marietta could no longer tell secrets about Dumbledore's Army, but her face was evidence that she had tried.  
  
"Marietta! What did Umbridge say?"  
  
Marietta seemed to come back to consciousness. "Tonight, you mean? Umbridge stopped me from saying whatever it was I was saying, so she could give some orders to some Slytherins she had waiting in the next room. They all went rushing off, and she took me up to Dumbledore's office, only while I'm walking there I started getting hot and I felt like I was going to faint, until I caught a look at myself in a suit of armour and..." Marietta buried her face in her hands and started crying again.  
  
"Please don't take on so," Cho said as soothingly as she could. "Do you remember seeing Peeves or anyone in the corridor?"  
  
"No, but there were lot of people in Dumbledore's office. Minister Fudge was there, and so was Thing-a-ma-bob, the Weasley that Penelope Clearwater was seeing..."  
  
"Percy Weasley?!"  
  
"Percy; that's it. Yes, he was there, too, and a couple of other Ministry wizards. And then they drag in Harry Potter, but he doesn't say anything. That's when they..." Marietta's voice caught. "They started throwing questions at me, but I had no idea what they were on about. And they just got louder and angrier and worse and worse and suddenly there's a big explosion, and I reckon Dumbledore caused it because when the smoke cleared he was gone!"  
  
Cho bowed her head. Her only friend had planned to betray Dumbledore's Army; that much was certain. Dumbledore himself had gotten wind of it, and took it upon himself to protect Harry and the others by shifting Marietta's memory. The marks on her face were clearly a warning: avoid this traitor.  
  
But Cho couldn't.  
  
Madam Pomfrey walked back to Cho. "Has she said anything helpful?"  
  
Cho didn't have to think; she shook her head. "I'd like to stay with her tonight, if I may. She may think of something, and besides, I need to bring her today's assignments."  
  
Marietta, who had thrown the towel back over her face when Pomfrey approached, clasped Cho's hand. "You don't have to do this..." she started.  
  
"Yes, I do," Cho smiled, squeezing Marietta's hand in her own. "It's my turn."  
  
xxx  
  
At first, Madam Pomfrey had looked at Marietta's face and told Professor Flitwick, "This should take an hour to sort out; I've seen this sort of thing before." However, by midnight she had to admit that she was completely foxed by whatever hex had caused the pimples. As she wrote a longer letter of explanation to Professor Flitwick, in his capacity as head of Ravenclaw, Cho and Marietta tried to carry on with their homework as if nothing unusual was happening.  
  
By one in the morning, both girls were asleep; Cho still fully clothed and asleep on top of the covers, her copy of "Hogwarts: A History" fallen to the floor. Marietta had also finally fallen asleep, but the foot of her bed was littered with half-written scrolls and library books.  
  
"HEM! HEM!"  
  
It was the torture machine dream; Cho recognized it, even though she was powerless to stop it. This time, she was stripped naked and tied spread-eagle--and face to the sky--to the machine. She couldn't see if any of the people, standing on the high cliffs above her, were ogling her nakedness; nor could she tell by listening. All she heard was the wind blowing over a desolate landscape; that, and the echoes of Umbridge's voice.  
  
Madam Umbridge, who now wore shocking pink robes and the kind of official regalia Minister Fudge only wore on special occasions, was reading from a scroll:  
  
"Because the prisoner has repeatedly offended against our society, she has demonstrated to the satisfaction of this Tribunal that she is incorrigible and must suffer the fate of all incorrigibles!"  
  
The machinery creaked to life. Cho could only watch in horror as tiny drops of her own blood began to appear on her stomach. The pain grew worse and worse as more and more dots appeared. Cho could barely keep her eyes open for the pain, but she did, forcing herself to read the message being carved into her stomach:  
  
BETRAYER OF CEDRIC BETRAYER OF THE D.A.  
  
"NOOO!!"  
  
Cho sat up in bed, clutching her stomach through her robes. She was breathing heavily and felt the all-too-familiar clamminess on her face and forehead.  
  
She heard footsteps: Madam Pomfrey was walking quickly down from the other end of the wing. "What in the name of Avalon... Miss Chang, has this been going on all year?!"  
  
Cho nodded, her face burning. "It's down to once a week or so; used to be more often."  
  
"I've been giving her the Draught of Peace when she needs it." Marietta was awake as well.  
  
"Do you need some now, child?"  
  
Cho glanced at the windows, and realized that the sun was just coming up. "No, thanks. I need to run back to Ravenclaw for a wash-up and to change clothes, and get a few things for Marietta."  
  
"She's able to do for herself, Miss Chang. There's nothing wrong with her legs."  
  
"But you can see what's wrong with her face! You can't send her to classes like that, Madam Pomfrey; it's cruel!"  
  
"Well, classes take precedence. I'd still like you to report here in the evenings, Miss Edgecombe. We can't just leave your face alone. But what do you propose to do in the meantime?"  
  
Cho glanced at Marietta, who was wringing her hands. "Let me ask about something."  
  
xxx  
  
An hour later, Cho and Marietta were walking toward the Great Hall for breakfast. Halfway there, though, they saw Draco Malfoy, flanked by Crabbe and Goyle. The Slytherins took one look at Marietta and burst out laughing. Malfoy then started singing very high, nasal and off-key; he was doing his imitation of a muezzin calling Muslims to prayer. Cho had borrowed one of Raina al-Qaba's veils for Marietta.  
  
They quickened their pace past the Slytherins, who Cho noticed now had little badges like the letter I on their robes. They were too busy laughing and singing to say anything to the girls.  
  
"It'll never work," Marietta moaned when they were around a corner. "Nothing will ever work! If I cover it up, it just calls all the more attention to it!"  
  
"Don't be upset," Cho said. "I'm sure Madam Pomfrey will sort this out in a day or two."  
  
"Somebody has to; I can't go around... What in Merlin's name?!"  
  
They had finally noticed one of the posters that sprang up overnight around Hogwarts, declaring Educational Decree number 28: Dolores Jane Umbridge was now Hogwart's Headmistress.  
  
Marietta grasped Cho's hand. "You don't think I had anything to do with that, do you?"  
  
"Somehow I think we may both have," Cho said, barely above a whisper. She suddenly let go of Marietta's hand. "We really should get on to breakfast, and just keep things as normal as possible for now."  
  
They accomplished this by Marietta standing behind Cho (even though she was taller) as they entered the Great Hall, and sitting at the end of the table closest to the door. Marietta didn't eat much; she didn't want to have to keep shifting the veil, and didn't want to remove it altogether. They left the Great Hall long before breakfast was done and went to their first class long before it was scheduled to begin.  
  
Muggle Studies and Arithmancy were uneventful, except for the other Ravenclaws asking Marietta about the veil. Diana Fairweather was teasing Marietta about converting to Raina's faith when Professor Idylwyld called a halt.  
  
"This is a classroom, not a pub, as our recently self-appointed Headmistress will tell you, if that's what you want." The professor looked clearly disgusted that Umbridge had taken over for Dumbledore, but there wasn't anything to be done about that now. "I believe the overall topic this week is the Muggle use of electricity instead of magic. Miss Chang, please read your report to the class."  
  
Cho stood and cleared her throat. "Ice Cubes versus Freezing Charms," she started.  
  
xxx  
  
Cho had just tucked into her lunch of lamb stew, with Marietta watching morosely with an empty plate from across the table, when all of Hogwarts shook as if it had been attacked by dragons.  
  
Students were shouting and screaming all over the Great Hall, unsure what was happening.  
  
McGonagall had amplified her voice with a Sonorus spell. "Everyone stay where you are! Remain seated!" A few of the Prefects rushed to the massive doors, trying to close them on the Great Hall.  
  
Before they could finish, however, they were shoved to the floor by a pair of Catherine wheels which not only pushed the doors open but off of their hinges. They screamed up to the enchanted ceiling as if they meant to keep on flying; before they hit, however, they each broke apart into a dozen smaller Catherine wheels, which flew away like manic birds to other parts of the castle.  
  
"D'you think that's Peeves?" Cho heard a frightened First Year ask.  
  
Just then, a fireworks dragon sailed into the Great Hall, belching fire and smoke. It dodged the faculty's attempts to Stun it as it circled the room a few times and flew back out into the hall.  
  
Terry Boot finally answered the question: "To do all that, it would take an army of Peeveses."  
  
A bottle rocket flew in next, skywriting obscenities, and that's when Cho realized: not an army of poltergeists; just two Weasleys. She started laughing, and found it hard to stop.  
  
"Cho?" Marietta looked worriedly at Cho. "What do we do now?"  
  
Cho reached up and undid the veil.  
  
"You may as well relax and have a good lunch," Cho said, still trying not to laugh. "Nobody will look at your face with THIS going on!"  
  
xxx  
  
She was right. The afternoon classes were basically a wash, with enchanted fireworks sailing in every five minutes or so. Usually they'd fly in, cause a disturbance, and fly right out again to another part of Hogwarts. Now and then, one seemed to get stranded in a classroom, and in Advanced Transfiguration Professor McGonagall, no less, took the unusual step of asking "Headmistress Umbridge" to remove it. By late afternoon Umbridge looked as if she'd been digging a garden with her bare hands in the middle of a minefield. And Cho felt no sympathy for her whatsoever.  
  
As Cho and Marietta entered the Common Room after the last class, Pablo Molina and Michael Corner were trading fireworks stories by the bay window. "For the first time in my life," Pablo was saying, "I envy that lunatic Colin Creevey. At least, I envy him his camera. You should have seen some of those things!"  
  
Cho and Marietta quickly went up the stairs to the girls' dormitories. Michael followed Cho with his eyes and half-nodded, but didn't say anything.  
  
Cho thought she knew what that was all about. He was in Dumbledore's Army, too, and would probably mistrust Cho as long as she was friends with Marietta. And he'd mistrust Marietta as long as that "Sneak" hex was on her.  
  
Cho didn't care what Michael thought of her, but it was a reminder that something had to be done about Marietta's face.  
  
As they prepared for another night in the hospital wing, Marietta looked over at Cho. "You really don't have to do this."  
  
"Yes, I do. I know what it's like to be alone, to want a friend but know you can't have one. Just because of what's written on your face."  
  
"Oh?" Marietta asked skeptically. "What's written on yours, then?"  
  
Cho turned to Marietta. "Chinese."  
  
Marietta looked puzzled. "That makes a difference?"  
  
"To some." Cho was about to say that it made a difference to Cedric's father, but Marietta interrupted.  
  
"But... But you're so pretty."  
  
Cho half-smiled. "I'm glad somebody thinks so." Then she turned to put more books in her bag; she also turned away because she didn't want Marietta to see her crying.  
  
Why is it, she thought; Oh my ancestors, why is it that I'm always punished if I think I might be pretty? My mother never lets me forget what she thinks, Cedric thought it and now he's dead; Harry thought it--  
  
That's what I have to do, then. I can't ask Granger directly to lift the hex; she'd refuse, of course. She's so proud of all these advanced tricks she can do. But she's friends with Harry, and if I ask him to ask Granger...  
  
Marietta, who was ready and waiting for Cho, cleared her throat. Cho grabbed her books and a change of robes, and they went to drop their things off at the hospital wing on their way in to dinner.  
  
The hospital wing was quiet that night, except for the occasional sputtering of the Weasleys' fireworks. Most had died away, and the few that had survived until after sunset were just a nuisance, a joke that had gone on far too long. Cho and Marietta went back to the hospital wing after dinner, and, with interruptions from Madam Pomfrey who tried countercurse after countercurse with no effect, they prepared for the next day's classes. The morning would be simple anyway: Binns for History and Flitwick for Charms. Wednesday afternoons, though, Marietta had Divination and both would have Advanced Potions; Snape was a professor for whom one had to prepare.  
  
xxx  
  
Cho was also preparing to meet with Harry, to ask him about Granger lifting the curse on Marietta. She tried to plan out everything that she would say: that Marietta had been her best friend during a very difficult year, that she certainly got the message behind the hex, and besides, someone had given her a Memory Modification, so now she couldn't betray Dumbledore's Army even if she wanted to, so, really, what was the harm...  
  
But the more she tried to run over her lines, the more nervous she felt about the whole business. Still, Marietta was miserable, and would be until her complexion cleared up, and Cho owed it to her to try to bring her some relief...  
  
She stayed by Marietta through most of the classes (except Divination, of course) and through dinner, walked her to the hospital wing, then raced back to the entrance to the Great Hall. There he was, just leaving the Great Hall. Cho raced up to him, breathless. Harry seemed glad enough to see her, so far so good, but said, "Over here," and led Cho to a corner of the entrance hall where there would be at least a little privacy.  
  
When they were in the corner, Harry spoke first: "Are you okay? Umbridge hasn't been asking you about the D.A., has she?"  
  
"Oh, no," Cho said quickly. "No, it was only... Well, I just wanted to say..." Cho realized that she had forgotten all of the speeches she had spent all day practicing. Still, she knew what she had to say: "Harry, I never dreamed Marietta would tell."  
  
"Yeah, well." That was all he said. He seemed grumpy, but so far he hadn't said "no," anyway.  
  
"She's a lovely person, really," Cho went on. "She just made a mistake--"  
  
"A lovely person who made a mistake?!" With Harry shouting it at her like that, Cho realized how stupid she sounded; as if Marietta had added two plus two to get five. Before she could say anything else, he angrily pressed on: "She sold us all out, including you!"  
  
"Well, we all got away, didn't we?" As far as Cho knew, nobody had been expelled or was even suspected, except perhaps Harry, and he was still walking about. "You know, her mum works for the Ministry, it's really difficult for her..."  
  
Harry cut her off. "Ron's dad works for the Ministry, too," he snarled, "and in case you hadn't noticed, he hasn't got 'sneak' written across HIS face!"  
  
Cho knew that he was right, but she also knew that he hadn't spent the last two nights in the hospital wing, watching Marietta suffer. "That was a really horrible trick of Hermione Granger's. She should have told us she'd jinxed that list."  
  
"I think it was a brilliant idea."  
  
Cho might even have accepted that, and gone on to ask again for Harry to say something to Hermione, but the cold way he said that--so smug, almost sneering, almost like Malfoy--was the last straw. Again, she became possessed by the spiteful, jealous Cho of Madam Puddifoot's: "Oh, yes, I forget. Of course, if it was darling Hermione's idea..."  
  
"Don't start crying again."  
  
"I wasn't going to!" she shouted. She couldn't even believe he'd just said that.  
  
"Yeah, well, good. I've got enough to cope with at the moment."  
  
"Go and COPE with it, then!" Cho stormed off toward the hospital wing.  
  
How dare he... How dare he! What can he possibly have to cope with that's worse than what Granger's put Marietta through? That Boy Who Lived reputation has finally given him the biggest head in Hogwarts!  
  
Cho got to the hospital wing and spent the next five minutes re-enacting her argument with Harry Potter.  
  
Marietta just looked at her friend. "How'd you know it was Granger, and what did I ever do to her to deserve THIS?"  
  
Cho was sitting on the next bed. "I... I can't tell you; not yet. Believe me, you're better off not knowing."  
  
"So I still have my curse."  
  
"Yes," nodded Cho, "and I have mine."  
  
"What curse is that?"  
  
"Well... it's... the fact is... I'M STILL IN LOVE WITH THAT STUPID STUPID PRAT!!" Cho threw herself on the bed, burying her face in the pillow.  
  
Marietta was quiet for a minute, then spoke softly. "I guess this is what they call a conflict of interest."  
  
Cho nodded, her face still against the pillow, and kept it there another minute before coming up for air.  
  
"I've just made things worse, haven't I?" Cho sniffed. This time she really was on the edge of tears.  
  
"Don't say that! If Pomfrey can't fix me up, surely Flitwick can. I mean, the only way things could be worse..."  
  
Before Marietta could finish her sentence, things got worse:  
  
Snape walked into the hospital wing. And Draco Malfoy was with him.  
  
Between them they held up the Captain of the Slytherin Quidditch team, Ashpeth Montague. He looked weak and extremely disoriented, as if he'd collapse if either Snape or Malfoy let go. Pomfrey conducted them to a bed near the door, and farthest from Marietta's bed. Cho and Marietta had no idea what had happened to him, but his boots squished as he walked, and he smelled vaguely like a swamp.  
  
After Madam Pomfrey had put screens up around Montague's bed, she walked over to the two girls. "Miss Chang, I can't indulge you any more. You have a dormitory room and a bed, and you'll have to sleep in it."  
  
"Must she, Madam Pomfrey?" Marietta asked woefully.  
  
"You're a patient and she's not; it's that simple. Still, I don't think this will last much longer."  
  
"My life is ruined," Marietta moaned, burying her face in her hands.  
  
"Don't say that!" Cho said. "We weren't Sorted into Ravenclaw for nothing. There's got to be an answer."  
  
"Any suggestions?"  
  
"Well, there's more than one way to skin a Kneazle. If I can't talk to Harry directly, I'll just have to find another route. I won't let you down, Marietta; I promise."  
  
xxx  
  
to be continued in part 26, wherein Cho hears from Penelope Clearwater and tries a more roundabout way to talk to Harry... 


	2. Chapter 26 The Quality of Mercy

OR DIE TRYING: CHO CHANG'S SIXTH YEAR  
  
By monkeymouse  
  
NB: JKRowling built the Potterverse; I'm just redecorating one of the rooms. And one of the great things about JKR telling the story from Harry's point of view is that stuff could be happening all over Hogwarts that Harry isn't aware of.  
  
Rated: PG  
  
Spoilers: Everything  
  
xxx  
  
26. The Quality of Mercy  
  
When Cho got back to her dormitory room that night, she put up her books and quills in her writing-desk. As she did so, she saw the rolled-up scroll tucked away in one half-open drawer. It was the letter she had begun to Penelope Clearwater, consisting only of one sentence. Still angry at Harry for what he'd said about Marietta, and still feeling miserable for being angry at Harry, she decided to finish the letter before homework or anything else. She redated the scroll "Wednesday, 7 April" and read what she'd already written:  
  
"Dear Penny,  
  
You told me this summer that you didn't understand how you could love and hate someone at the same time. I think I finally understand you..."  
  
"although I wish to Heaven that I didn't," Cho continued writing.  
  
"I don't know if my grip on my emotions has gotten any better, but I've known all along, I suppose, that Cedric is gone and life goes on and all of that sensible Ravenclaw rubbish. Anyway, there's someone I've wanted to be with for a long time, and we've managed to get together once or twice, but he keeps saying and doing these stupid, spiteful, idiotic things, and it truly drives me mad!"  
  
Cho stopped writing for a minute, wiped her eyes, then went on:  
  
"I suppose some of the things I said and did were stupid and idiotic as well, but I really feel that his stupidity provoked my stupidity. Anyway, that's what I see when I look back on it all.  
  
And yet, he simply doesn't want to be sensible and sort it all out. And so things as they are, with me being unable to see him, to talk to him, leaves this hollow, hurting feeling within me. This relationship hasn't gone anywhere good, for the most part, but the only way I would feel worse would be to make up my mind never to have anything to do with him again. And I can't do that, Penny; I still care for him so very deeply.  
  
So, tell me, Penny: have I come even close to understanding what's happened with you and Percy? And does it happen to all of us?  
  
By the way, Percy was here at Hogwarts the other day. I didn't see him, but I heard that he came up with Fudge, and he may have been part of some big blow-up between Fudge and Dumbledore. Have you heard anything about that?  
  
Please write to me as soon as you can, even if you don't have all the answers yet. As the old saying goes, misery loves company, and talking with you this summer made me feel a lot less miserable."  
  
Cho signed the letter, but, before tying it to Quan Yin's leg, she stroked the owl's glossy feathers, wishing she could give it a strong hug instead. The bird wouldn't understand, she told herself, as she tied the letter on and set Quan Yin loose to fly to Cambridge.  
  
The bird wouldn't understand, she thought again as she watched the owl fly into the night, and I don't understand either. I don't understand why, at this very moment, I hate Harry Potter for being such a thick-headed, unfeeling clod, and yet all I want to do now is run to him, throw my arms around him, hold him tightly and have him hold me...  
  
Homework, she scolded herself. Work is the anodyne, as they say. At least it will keep me busy; so many long assignments to do with the Easter break just about to start.  
  
So Cho opened up her Muggle Studies texts and started writing. Two hours later, when it was past midnight and she went to bed, she'd filled several scrolls with her essay on Muggle flying machines--yet she couldn't remember a word of what she'd written.  
  
xxx  
  
Once classes were over and the break officially began, Cho found that she had more than enough time on her hands to finish her assignments. She went back to spending as much time with Marietta as she could.  
  
Marietta was still in the hospital wing. The hex which Madam Pomfrey had assumed would take an hour to sort out was in its fourth day, and resisting all attempts of being undone. It was also resisting any attempts to cover up the blemishes. Any kind of makeup applied to Marietta's face, even Queenie Clarinda's Coverall for Cruel Complexions, simply beaded up and rolled off of Marietta's face like rain off of a windowpane.  
  
"Cho," Marietta moaned for the tenth time since Monday night, "you've got to tell me: what did I do to deserve this? Maybe I can go to Granger myself, but I have to know!"  
  
Once again, Cho refused to tell her. It would do no good for Marietta to appeal to Granger's sense of mercy--anyone who could whip up a hex like this one surely had no mercy in her heart at all. Besides, the fear never left Cho that, by speaking the wrong word at the wrong time or place about Dumbledore's Army, her own face might be next.  
  
So she was pulled between two poles: her loyalty to her friend and Prefect, and her loyalty to--damn it all, Chang, admit it, she scolded herself--her love for Harry. A love that looked like it was going exactly nowhere.  
  
She was pondering all this Friday afternoon, at a table in the library, when she looked up just in time to see Hermione Granger. She was looking at Cho; then, as if she was afraid of getting caught, Granger turned and quickly walked out of the library, with several large volumes in hand.  
  
Are you my competition? Cho vaguely wondered as she watched Hermione leave. Or am I being a fool? She's never been linked romantically with Harry, except by that Skeeter woman and all that lying tripe she wrote last year. She went to the Yule Ball with the Durmstrang Champion, not Harry; he rescued her in the Second Task, not Harry. What am I afraid of?  
  
Worse: why am I afraid at all? Because I am; I'm afraid...  
  
Cho rose and quickly left the library, returned to her bed in Ravenclaw and stayed there until dinner. She felt that she was again on the verge of losing control of her emotions, but not over Cedric.  
  
xxx  
  
Saturday she threw herself back into her studies, and worked with Marietta on her assignments as well. One assignment was something of a day of rest for Cho, since it involved ancient Chinese divination methods, although Professor Firenze's grasp of those methods was a bit tenuous. Then again, China wasn't home to centaurs; the closest they had to demi-humans were the legendary ape people of Hubei province. But, as she sat in the hospital wing repeating to Marietta the lessons she had learned from her parents about throwing coins and divining the meaning of passages in the "I Ching", Cho realized that she hadn't felt this--NORMAL--in ages.  
  
Sunday morning, Cho woke from a fitful sleep. She couldn't remember her dreams, but she was sure that she had yet another nightmare, but without Marietta to help her this time.  
  
All thought of nightmares vanished when she looked at the window. Quan Yin was back.  
  
She rushed to open the window for the owl, to untie the letter, to read it:  
  
"Dear Cho,  
  
I was so happy to hear from you! I just wish you'd written more often--you promised, you know!  
  
I heard about Percy, from his father, actually. Just before Christmas he'd been attacked by a serpent and ended up in St. Mungo's. Now, I'll be the first to say that some of the things Percy said last summer were horrid and almost unforgiveable. But I'd come to like Mr. Weasley, so I Apparated to his bedside as soon as I heard the news. He tells me things he's heard around the Ministry about Percy. He told me about the row with Dumbledore, because a friend of his also went up there. The Ministry accused Dumbledore of trying to undermine Fudge--not the first time for such accusations, mind you, but Fudge claimed that Dumbledore was getting up an army of students to help him! How could anyone believe anything so foolish?"  
  
How indeed, Cho smiled. I'll tell you all about it, one day. She returned to the letter:  
  
"Dumbledore's in hiding, I understand, which left that Umbridge person in charge up there. At least, that's what the Ministry likes to think. Arthur--Mr. Weasley--didn't have to go far to convince me: I remember Dumbledore, and I know he's sharper than a dragon's claw. No matter where he is, I'm sure he still has a hand in running Hogwarts.  
  
And now for the other matter. You seem to have jumped out of the cauldron and into the fire, as they say. At least you have some good memories of Cedric. It must seem worse with someone you like who insists on acting thick-headed, because you know they can be better than that. That's the way I feel about Percy, anyway. I honestly think he'll come to his senses some day, and realize that he's already been Best Boy and doesn't have to let his ambition get the best of his good sense. I'm sure he'll see that Dumbledore was right and Fudge was wrong about You Know Who, and that he'll crawl back to his parents (and to me) with his tail between his legs asking to be forgiven. And I'll forgive him, of course. It's what you do if you love someone.  
  
Of course, maybe I'm on a fool's errand, and Percy will always be Percy. All I can do is remember the past, and hope for the future. It's not much advice, but I offer it to you as well. Especially since, if you really like this other boy, you'll do exactly that anyway: remember the good times, forgive him the bad times, and hope for a future together.  
  
Speaking of the future, I have to go; I've been taking classes at Cambridge (easily done since my parents both work there anyway). I expect we both have a lot of end-of-term studying to do, but please try to write me again, as soon as you can. And I hope everything turns out all right for you.  
  
Penelope"  
  
As soon as Cho read it, she knew Penelope was exactly right. She could forgive Harry anything, even the hex Granger put on Marietta, as long as Harry was willing to see reason and talk to her. But approach Harry directly? Not after what happened; it was still too soon. But she'd promised Marietta she'd think of another way.  
  
But she didn't think of one until the next morning, and it came to her quite by accident.  
  
She had just come down from her dormitory and was crossing the Common Room when she glanced at the day bed, and her heart leapt into her throat. How could Harry get in...?  
  
Then she realized it wasn't Harry; just another student with disordered black hair. It turned out to be Michael Corner--and the problem suddenly fell into place.  
  
He must have fallen asleep reading last night, since a small stack of textbooks was on the floor beside the day bed. She didn't want to wake him up by shaking him; that was a good way to get yourself hexed. So she called out, "Michael?"  
  
Corner shook his head slightly, stretched like a cat, then turned over to face Cho. "Well," he smiled, "you're a pleasant sight to wake up to." Cho felt her cheeks start to burn at the compliment, until Corner's brow furrowed; "Or you would be, if you weren't still siding with Edgecombe."  
  
"That's something I have to talk to you about." Cho sat in a chair across from the day bed. "I understand that the Army could have gotten into trouble because of her, but they didn't, and now they can't."  
  
"What does that mean?"  
  
"Somebody--maybe Dumbledore--put a Memory Modification Charm on her. She doesn't remember a thing about the Army."  
  
"Well, that's good news."  
  
"But she's still got that awful hex on her face. I'm not asking for your help because she almost betrayed the Army; I'm asking because she's still a Ravenclaw Prefect--and one of my best friends. Will you hear me out?"  
  
Corner thought about it for a second, then sat up in the day bed. "Right, then, what is it?"  
  
"I need to talk to Harry Potter."  
  
"So talk to him; you don't need me for that."  
  
"Well, we, we had a sort of a falling-out..." Cho felt herself blushing again.  
  
"And now you want to apologise?"  
  
"I think we both need to apologise, but he won't listen to me. But you--you're friends with Ginny Weasley, aren't you?"  
  
Corner's smile broadened until it was almost a leer. "Yeah, I guess you'd say that."  
  
"Next time you see Ginny, could you ask her to talk to Harry? Or at least talk to her brother Ron; he's in Harry's year, after all."  
  
"Let me see if I've got this," Corner smiled. "You want me to talk to Ginny, about Ginny talking to Harry Potter, about Harry talking to you?"  
  
"I know it sounds silly when you put it that way, but I can't talk with him directly. And we really need to talk."  
  
"All right, then," Corner said. "Want to walk down to the Great Hall for breakfast? We can figure out a plan of attack."  
  
"Actually, I have to stop by the hospital wing. But thanks for doing this for me; I owe you a favour."  
  
"If you want to pay me back, just beat Gryffindor for the Quidditch Cup."  
  
"Beat your own girlfriend? She's Gryffindor's new Seeker."  
  
"Yeah, and that's been a hell of a lot to compete with. But that's a story for another time. See you later." And he was up on his feet and out through the bookcase.  
  
Cho stood in the empty Common Room. She was pleased that she thought of a way (hopefully) to get Harry to talk to her ... and a bit puzzled by Michael Corner, and the way he acted, and the way it made her feel... Maybe she'd better reread Penelope's letter...  
  
xxx  
  
to be continued in part 27, wherein Cho watches the Weasley twins depart and looks forward to the Quidditch Cup match... 


	3. Chapter 27 If Misery Loves Company

OR DIE TRYING: CHO CHANG'S SIXTH YEAR  
  
By monkeymouse  
  
NB: JKRowling built the Potterverse; I'm just redecorating one of the rooms. And one of the great things about JKR telling the story from Harry's point of view is that stuff could be happening all over Hogwarts that Harry isn't aware of.  
  
Rated: PG  
  
Spoilers: Everything  
  
xxx  
  
27. If Misery Loves Company  
  
The Easter break was basically quiet for Cho, as breaks are supposed to be. Between time spent in the library on her own studies, helping Marietta with her work, and paying cheer-up visits to the hospital wing, she wasn't in Ravenclaw House except to sleep most days, and was hardly in the rest of Hogwarts at all. This allowed her to focus on all of the really important things that had gone begging recently: Quidditch practice for the Cup match, her studies for next year's N.E.W.T.s, and the so-far fruitless search for some way to remove Marietta's jinx.  
  
Cho grew more and more worried about Marietta as more and more remedies failed to remove the violent acne from her face. One night she almost produced her Swan Patronus to try to cheer Marietta up, but she hesitated. She couldn't very well admit to Marietta where she'd learned to do that; besides, Cho grumbled to herself, maybe Granger's put a hex on that as well--try to do any DA magic now and I'd break out in the word "show-off." It would be just like her, too...  
  
She Transfigured a pillow into a puppy-dog instead, until Madam Pomfrey put a stop to that. "I don't much fancy any animal running about my ward," she sniffed. "It would upset Filch and it's hard on the other patients."  
  
At the moment the "other patients" consisted of Ashpeth Montagu, the Slytherin Chaser. He was still confined to bed at the other end of the wing. By now the entire school had heard that the Weasley twins had been challenged by Montagu, a member of Madam Umbridge's Inquisitorial Squad. They had showed their respect by shoving him into a Vanishing Closet on the fourth floor. When he reappeared four days later, just a few doors down in the boys' lavatory, his nerves seemed shattered and he couldn't give an accounting of where he had vanished to nor what had happened to him. He still couldn't.  
  
It was Sunday night, the third of May; classes would resume the next day. Cho had brought her dinner to the hospital wing to eat with Marietta, who ate hardly a bite and kept glancing sadly at the beekeeper's hat she would wear to classes the next day. The heavy netting would block the view of her face, but not hide it altogether.  
  
"Am I going to have to go through my whole life like this?" she said suddenly, throwing her fork angrily down on the bed.  
  
"We can't give up," Cho said, trying to sound as soothing as she could. "Madam Pomfrey says that even the failed attempts teach them something."  
  
"It teaches me that this is all a waste of time," Marietta grumbled. "I only just got my teeth back to normal." A previous attempt by Professor Flitwick to lift the hex had left Marietta for a full week with every other tooth tinted green. "It's been almost a month!"  
  
"I can't believe it'll go on much longer," Cho smiled; "just wait."  
  
"Easier said than done," Marietta said through a mouthful of curried mutton. She had stopped asking Cho how the jinx had happened. On the one hand, Cho was glad that the pressure of revealing the secret of Dumbledore's Army was off; on the other hand, it looked as if Marietta was losing hope altogether.  
  
"Things have to start changing soon," Cho said, although she wasn't sure she believed it anymore herself.  
  
xxx  
  
One collossal change happened Monday afternoon at five o'clock.  
  
Chio was on her way back to Ravenclaw to drop off her books when she heard steps racing along the corridors. They seemed to be coming from all directions, and growing louder, but so far she hadn't seen anything. One student would run past her, then would run back, followed by three or four more. This happened several times until she stopped one of the students she recognized: a Ravenclaw Seeker named Torrance Chambers.  
  
"What's going on?" she asked.  
  
"The twins," Chambers said after catching his breath. "Not sure what they did, but they done something big. Their fat's in the fire for sure now."  
  
"What do you mean? Where are they?"  
  
"Umbitch and her pet snakes have been chasing them all around the castle. Last I saw, they were headed toward the Great Hall. Come on!"  
  
Chambers took off in a mad rush, with Cho right behind him. But he didn't know why she was so interested.  
  
Cho couldn't tell Chambers why she was interested. They were in the Army too. Did Umbridge suspect that? Would she try to make them talk about it?  
  
Word of the twins leading the Inquisitorial Squad a merry chase had spread rapidly, and Cho and Chambers found that the only way they could get close to the Great Hall and the entrance to the castle was by doubling back to the second floor and trying for the stairs. Even then, students were crowded into every available space, and even the castle ghosts floated above the entrance hall, looking down on Umbridge and Fred and George Weasley. The two seemed remarkably composed; if they knew Umbridge had gotten the upper hand, they gave no sign.  
  
The new Headmistress and the twins were saying something to each other, which Cho couldn't make out from the second floor. Argus Filch had come to stand beside Umbridge, chattering happily away about something. She still didn't forgive the caretaker for bursting into the Owlery, destroying the moment between her and Harry... Was Harry here? She couldn't tell; the press of students was too thick.  
  
Suddenly the twins raised their wands and, as one, shouted "Accio Brooms!"  
  
Why were they pointing their wands into the castle, Cho wondered. Wouldn't their brooms be out with the other Quidditch... Quidditch! That's right; they'd been banned from the game along with Harry! So the brooms were--  
  
Cho pressed herself against the wall as the sound of rattling chains came nearer. The two brooms sailed to their owners, one of them still dragging chains; apparently Umbridge had the brooms secured to the wall. The twins jumped on their brooms, exchanged a few more words with a purple-faced Umbridge; then, one proclaimed to the crowd, "If anyone fancies buying a Portable Swamp, as demonstrated upstairs, come to number ninety-three Diagon Alley: Weasleys' Wizarding Wheezes! Our new premises!"  
  
The other finished the sentence: "Special discounts to Hogwarts students who swear they're going to use our products to get rid of this old bat."  
  
Even as Umbridge yelled for someone to stop them, the Weasley twins shot up level with the second-floor landing. Cho realized that she was looking at them, through Peeves the poltergeist.  
  
"Give her hell from us, Peeves!" one of them said. And Peeves actually tipped his hat to them and saluted as the twins flew back down and out the front doors.  
  
"A swamp upstairs?" Chambers was saying. "That's worth missing a meal. Let's go check it out, eh?"  
  
Cho nodded, only half-hearing what Chambers was saying to her, and following behind him automatically. Her mind was filled with one thought:  
  
So that's what it means to be a Gryffindor.  
  
xxx  
  
The twins had told Peeves to give Umbridge hell; for the next week, Hogwarts smelled like Hell--smelled like sulphur and brimstone and dungbombs and swamp gas, at any rate. Students took to casting Bubble-Head Charms on themselves to try to keep out the odours. Some of the witches, less afraid of the stench in the halls than of having their looks distorted by glass bowls, Transfigured their textbooks or quills or anything handy into bunches of flowers. They would hold the sweet-smelling flowers up to their noses, walking quickly through the corridors and trying to pretend that their eyes weren't watering in spite of all.  
  
True to their word, the Weasley twins had enchanted part of the fifth floor of the east wing of the castle into a swamp. It looked dubious and smelled even worse. It was a Gryffindor, a Third Year named Dennis Creavey (who Cho recognized from the Army) who first volunteered to try to wade across it. The swamp seemed no more than a wet spot some fifteen feet in length, but Creevey got hardly one-third of the way across when he sank like a stone. Other students, gathered to look at the oddity, glanced at each other nervously, not sure what to do next. When Creevey broke the surface, flailing about and apparently unable to swim, a Seventh Year Hufflepuff, Bristella Bernini, used a Locomotor spell to lift him out of the swamp and back to solid ground.  
  
Creevey's only reaction was a wide grin, "That was so cool!"  
  
Headmistress Umbridge told the faculty to get rid of the swamp. Flitwick declared that he couldn't remove it, although he never really tried--just sort of "admired the craftsmanship" of it, as Roger Davies told Cho after that weekend's Quidditch practice. McGonagall, as Assistant Headmistress, also proclaimed herself unable to remove it, although Cho suspected that she didn't try very hard either. Umbridge angrily tried to remove the swamp herself, but none of her spells moved it in the least, and Filch couldn't do a thing about it, being a Squib, except drag a punt up from the lake to the fifth floor and ferry students from one shore to the other.  
  
This had the effect of keeping Filch stuck on the fifth floor during the day, unable to patrol the castle, and as a result the chaos increased. The Stinkpellets were blooming indoors as the flowers were blooming outdoors in the sunny month of May, and there was nobody to stop it. A kind of mania took hold of most of the younger students, touched off by the Weasley twins. The new sport (which the older students, looking at the impending arrival of the O.W.L.s and N.E.W.T.s, didn't share) seemed to be, how much can you get away with. And for a period of about two weeks, a lot of the students tried to get away with just about anything.  
  
Umbridge sent out her Inquisitorial Squad to keep whatever peace they could (and by whatever means they chose), but the students were no longer afraid of them and fought back. So it was that, on the Thursday after the Weasleys' departure, Cyril Warrington--a Chaser for Slytherin as well as a member of the Inquisitorial Squad--was checked into the hospital wing. He had tried to break up a foodfight in the Great Hall, and was repaid with a Scabrous Jinx. All the skin on his face was dark and stiff, cracked and peeling and looked likely to fall away at any second; Madam Pomfrey put the screens up around his bed before Marietta and Cho (who was spending more time in the hospital wing just to dodge the madness in the corridors) could see if the jinx continued down the rest of his body.  
  
The next morning, Pansy Parkinson had started to tell off students outside the Great Hall not to "repeat that foul bit of business yesterday evening--" That was as far as she got before another student hexed her, too. She ran crying to the hospital wing and burst in, with a fresh pair of antlers growing from her head.  
  
Marietta and Cho glanced up at what they were now calling "the Slytherin ward", then turned back to their breakfast.  
  
"Animorph Jinx," Marietta muttered, spreading marmalade on her toast. "Suits her."  
  
"I always thought she looked more like a dog than a deer," Cho replied as she finished her oatmeal.  
  
"Well, they know how to help her, at least," Marietta said, throwing down her knife. "I've been here a month! You said..."  
  
"I said I'd try. I can't get through to them!"  
  
"Through to WHO??"  
  
"Erm, Granger and her friends. Maybe I'm wrong, and they had nothing to do with this."  
  
But Cho knew she wasn't wrong, and every day of watching Marietta suffer just made her madder and madder at Hermione Granger.  
  
The next day was a Saturday, and there were only three more Saturdays before the House Quidditch Cup match. Ravenclaw was supposed to practice that morning, but, as Cho crossed the Common Room, she saw a notice on the board: QUIDDITCH PRACTICE MOVED TO SUNDAY AFTERNOON.  
  
She recognized the note as Roger's writing, realized that he must have just put it up, and went to the Great Hall to see if he was there. He was just about to tuck into some sausages.  
  
"Roger, why'd they rearrange us?"  
  
He glanced at the Head Table, then lowered his voice. "Umbitch. Her bright idea to put in another match next week: Slytherin and Hufflepuff."  
  
"They're surely not competing for the Cup!"  
  
"Of course not; she's just trying to get this lot to calm down. Or at least buy herself a couple of hours peace."  
  
"Next Saturday, you say? Should be interesting. Warrington's face hasn't cleared up yet, and Montagu's still all befuddled, so Slytherin's without its two top Chasers."  
  
"I don't think she counted on that," Roger grinned. "I think Snape actually tried to talk her out of it; this has been their worst year."  
  
"And our best," Cho smiled.  
  
"You feel good about the match, then?"  
  
"Why shouldn't I? The Gryffindor Seeker doesn't know the game, their Keeper is hopeless, and one of their new Beaters nearly concussed himself with his own bat! I was at the hospital wing when they brought him in!"  
  
"Never underestimate the opponent, Cho."  
  
"You worry about your N.E.W.T.s, Rog; we're definitely getting back the Cup."  
  
Roger stood up. "See you at tomorrow's practice, then." As he walked away, Cho realized that she was hungrier than usual, without even the pressure of a practice to dull her appetite. She dashed to the hospital wing to have breakfast with Marietta.  
  
xxx  
  
Marietta was right about one thing: most of the Slytherin didn't spend long in the hospital wing. Madam Pomfrey sorted Pansy Parkinson out the first thing Monday morning--"Just to get her whining gob out of here," Marietta said under her breath, and she was partly right. Parkinson kept up a non-stop high-pitched keen of despair all the time she was in the wing, until Flitwick was called in to apply the counter-jinx (under Severus Snape's watchful eye) and remove the antlers, which had grown to an impressive twelve points.  
  
Cho had tried--and failed--to forget the last time she had had anything to do with Pansy Parkinson: on a gloomy street in Hogsmeade, on Valentine's Day, with Pansy teasing Cho and saying that Harry wasn't as good-looking as Cedric had been...  
  
No! Cho scolded herself; don't drag all that up now! Instead, it's best wishes to whoever hexed Pansy, after what she'd said about Harry-- That's as far as she got before the butterflies started.  
  
Snape also loitered about the wing, casting baleful glances at the Ravenclaw girls. "What's he doing here still?" Marietta whispered.  
  
"Those other two are Chasers," Cho whispered back. "He needs to play them this Saturday."  
  
"Good luck," Marietta replied.  
  
Warrington's Scabrous Jinx was also lifted that day, although Snape kept interrupting Flitwick by questioning Warrington, demanding to know who had Jinxed him and what they were doing wrong when he caught them.  
  
"Severus, please!" the little Charms professor turned to Snape. "Can't you question the lad later? This isn't helping my concentration. We wouldn't want the damage to be permanent, would we?"  
  
Snape snorted, but continued to loom over Warrington's bed until he was cured and sent away.  
  
Montagu's case of mental disorder, however, wasn't cured so easily. The next day, Montagu's parents actually arrived at the castle. Pomfrey had put the screens up so Marietta and Cho couldn't see what was happening, but the Montagus confronted Pomfrey during morning classes, and gave Marietta plenty to hear.  
  
"You should have heard it," Marietta smiled, as Cho joined her over the lunch hour. "First they tear into Pomfrey like a couple of starved hippogriffs, only she's not having any of that, and tells them off. 'First of all,' she says, 'I'm not about to guess at how to bring your son around. If you want me to throw spells at him willy-nilly and hope he comes back to himself, then fine: put that on a scroll and I'll sign it. But I don't want to risk his mental condition any more than it's been risked already. Now, your boy's got himself in rather a vicious circle; I can sort out his trouble, but not until he gives me a clue as to what the problem is, and the problem won't let him tell me.'  
  
"'Well, couldn't a Legilimens get through to him?' demands Mister Montagu, and Pomfrey replies, 'The only one on staff here I'd trust to get the information without damage to himself or your son is Albus Dumbledore. It's a pity he's no longer Headmaster here, but you can take that up with the Ministry.'  
  
"So Montagu's folks must be breathing fire at this point, because they storm out of the wing, and I guess they had some young Slytherin escorting them around, because then you hear Mister Montagu yelling, 'Don't just stand there, boy; take me to that damned Umbridge!' I imagine she got more than an earful."  
  
"Serves her right," Cho muttered, deliberately adding up a long column of numbers and not looking at Marietta. Arithmancy was right after lunch, and they had to finish up a couple of very tricky logarithms.  
  
After a minute, Marietta looked up at Cho, her voice dropped so that Cho, ten inches away, could hardly hear it. "All this--my face--has something to do with Dumbledore leaving, doesn't it?"  
  
After six weeks, Cho was running out of ways to avoid answering the question. "Marietta, what would you do if the Ministry turned out to be wrong about something--something very important?"  
  
"But how could the Ministry ever be wrong about anything?" Marietta asked. "I mean, they're the best and the brightest wizards and witches we have, and surely they know lots of stuff that the rest of us don't."  
  
Cho smiled a bit weakly. "Then this can't be about Dumbledore against the Ministry, can it?"  
  
The two went back to working out their Arithmancy.  
  
They finished just in time for Cho to deliver both her work and Marietta's to Professor Vector. After class, Cho crossed the courtyard, caught sight of Harry, Ron Weasley and Granger, and very deliberately looked away.  
  
This has gone on too long, Cho told herself, but I'll not go begging to Granger. If she hasn't heart enough to feel a little pity and change Marietta back, and if Harry hasn't brains enough to see what a cold vindictive witch he has for a friend, then they deserve each other. I'll not seek him out. I'll take the only revenge he seems to understand: Quidditch. I'll get the Snitch, and the Cup, and Gryffindor will know what it's like to go without the Cup, and then HE will come looking for ME...  
  
xxx  
  
to be continued in part 28, wherein Cho plays in the Quidditch Cup match ... 


	4. Chapter 28 The Final Match

OR DIE TRYING: CHO CHANG'S SIXTH YEAR

By monkeymouse

NB: JKRowling built the Potterverse; I'm just redecorating one of the rooms. And one of the great things about JKR telling the story from Harry's point of view is that stuff could be happening all over Hogwarts that Harry isn't aware of.

Rated: PG

Spoilers: Everything

xxx

28. The Final Match

"Are you sure you won't come along? You've hardly been out of the castle in weeks."

"Admit it, Cho; I've hardly been out of the hospital wing in weeks."

"And that can't be a good thing for you. I mean, if you were laid up..."

"I hope you don't think THIS is a good thing!" Marietta gestured angrily toward her face. No change after six weeks: the blotches and pimples that spelled out the word SNEAK were still on her face.

"Of course not, but--"

"Look, I appreciate what you're trying to do, honestly, but I just don't want to walk into that stadium and have people stare at THIS!"

Cho bit her lip. "Do you want me to stay with you, then?"

"You know better than to ask..."

"It's Hufflepuff against Slytherin, Marietta! Matches don't get more one-sided than that! They're not even in contention for the Cup!"

"It's still Quidditch, Cho. And I like Quidditch, but you live for it. Besides, I remember times you were in the hospital wing during matches. Even though you HAD to be here, you were crawling up the walls. I couldn't ask you just to keep me company."

"You could, you know; ask me that, or so much more..."

"Except the one thing I really need to ask..."

"Please, let's not have that again!"

"Just tell me what I did to deserve this!!"

"I ... Marietta, it wouldn't change a thing, even if you knew. I'm convinced that Hermione Granger did this, and she won't undo it even if you apologise. She has her reasons."

"And somebody could still get in trouble over this, which is why nobody was supposed to tell in the first place?" Cho just nodded. "Then it really doesn't matter how I brought this on myself; just that I did."

"Marietta, I--"

"Let it be," Marietta sighed. "Go enjoy your match. Just come by after lunch. The Arithmancy final is going to be a werewolf."

"I'll come by FOR lunch, then," Cho smiled. She lightly touched the back of Marietta's hand, then left the hospital wing.

xxx

"Right-o, Hogwarts, and welcome!"

Any normal match-up of Slytherin and Hufflepuff would have been an utterly predictable slaughter, but things were hardly normal now. For one thing, Slytherin Captain Montagu was still very much off of his game. Madam Pomfrey hadn't even wanted to let him out of the hospital wing to play. It finally took Professor Snape, late Friday night, performing Legilimency on Montagu, to even begin to sort out the trouble.

"Apparently it was the Weasley twins who caused this," Snape told Pomfrey, glowering at Marietta and Cho as if they were responsible. "They shoved him into a vanishing closet not far from where he was found. Unfortunately, the missing four days is still rather a mystery. It's safe to say that he was sent to someplace swamplike and largely uninhabited; he didn't see anyone, wizard or Muggle, and apparently spent much of the time afraid he would be killed if he were seen. He was chased by something vicious; it may or may not have been magical, but I can't find out yet."

"Have you learned enough to try Memory Modification, then?"

"Not yet, I'm afraid. I might be tampering with other memories; something similar seems to have happened to him in his past, and I wasn't able to sort them out. I'm afraid I can't do more than give him a Contentment Potion for the match."

"I'm not sure that he should play the match at all, then."

"And, of course," Snape said, his eyebrows arched and his voice dripping acid, "your status as Head of Hufflepuff has no bearing on your opinion."

"No more than being Head of Slytherin bears on yours," Pomfrey replied, looking just as sternly at Snape. "I'm sure that we both put the best health of the student above all else. Just bring round the potion whenever it's ready."

Very few people simply dismissed Snape as if he were a First Year, but Pomfrey would have taken on the Dark Lord himself if he decided to mess about with "her" hospital wing. Snape gave Pomfrey a very quick nod, glowered at the Ravenclaw girls again, and left.

Snape must have brought the potion later that night, since, when Cho came to the hospital wing for breakfast with Marietta, Montagu was gone. However...

"Montagu's looking a bit wobbly this morning," Lee Jordan announced as the Slytherins came onto the field. "Maybe they should have let him get sorted out a little longer, but, after all, he's the Captain and this will probably be his last match at Hogwarts. And, in a way, his condition is a final tribute to the Terrible Twins--"

"Confine your remarks to the match, Jordan!"

"Sorry, Professor McGonagall. And here comes the Hufflepuff squad!"

Cho felt the lump rise in her throat as she noted the Hufflepuff players still wore patches with the initials CD. It's a pity you couldn't have won the Cup in his honour, Cho thought; but then, I couldn't let you. And Cedric would have expected me to play as hard as he did...

"There's Hooch's whistle, and the match is on!"

And it was no normal match. The Hufflepuff players still pushed their hardest, as if they had something to prove, as if the match was indeed being played in honour of Cedric Diggory, Hogwarts Champion in the Triwizard Tournament--and victim of Voldemort and his Death Eaters. Cho remembered the Quibbler article, and the Death Eaters Harry had named--some of whose sons were on the Slytherin team.

This is about Cedric, Cho realized; it's as close to revenge as a Hufflepuff can get.

They didn't use any special plays or new strategies against Slytherin; they simply refused to be cowed by the dirty tricks and kept up an aggressive style of play that was unusual for the Hufflepuffs. The tricks were as dirty as ever; the Slytherin Beaters still targeted every Hufflepuff player, but made sure to do so from behind another player, so that Hooch couldn't catch them at it. Their favourite target seemed to be Hufflepuff Seeker Summerby, but he'd gotten much better at dodging Bludgers while keeping an eye out for the Snitch.

As for Montagu, he was clearly the worse for wear. At first he was good enough to catch the Quaffle if someone passed it to him, but when he tried to take it to his own rings ten minutes into the match, everyone knew he was in trouble. He wouldn't take himself out, though, and Snape didn't interfere; it would have been a serious breach of protocol if he had. The other Chasers tried to work around him as his condition worsened. At one point, when Montagu passed the Quaffle straight to a Hufflepuff Chaser, Lee Jordan announced that "Montagu pulled a Weasley that time."

Finally, after several false sightings and escapes, the two Seekers caught sight of the Snitch almost at once. Slytherin was up 190 to 50: catching the Snitch would be a clear victory, Cho knew, but Hufflepuff could still win it. For its part, the Snitch seemed especially agitated this day. It zipped about, changing course at odd angles, speeding around and between other players, with both Summerby and Malfoy in hot pursuit. They stayed equally close to the Snitch, with no clear advantage...

until Montagu, seeing the Quaffle going above his head, reached up, grabbed it, and passed the Quaffle to Malfoy. In the one second it took Malfoy to dodge the Quaffle, Summerby leaned forward--

"That's it! The match is over! 200 to 190, and a brilliant come-from-behind victory for Hufflepuff!"

Brilliant, echoed Cho's thoughts; that really was a brilliant match. They didn't let Slytherin stop them, they just kept pushing and pushing. That's how we beat Slytherin, and in a fortnight that's how we'll beat--

"Cho?"

Cho came to attention. She realized that she had been replaying moments from the match in her mind, and that the stadium was almost empty now; the match must have ended five minutes ago. Now, Luna Lovegood was standing by her side.

"Hey, Cho, what's the slowest breed of dog?"

What?

Before Cho could think of anything, Luna answered her own riddle: "A tarry-er, of course." She smiled and tugged at Cho's sleeve. "You'll miss lunch, silly."

Cho smiled, too, as she followed Luna back to the castle.

xxx

For the next two weeks, Cho seemed reborn. Her world pulled into a tight circle: the upcoming final exams, in N.E.W.T.-level classes; spending time with Marietta; and Quidditch. Especially Quidditch. The morning after the Hufflepuff victory, Ravenclaw had a practice, and things went perfectly. Cho pushed her old Comet Two Sixty to speeds it wasn't supposed to be able to reach. She didn't waste a second of practice doing anything but find and chase the Snitch. And it was the same story the following Sunday.

"Good to have you back," Roger said to her as that second practice ended; six days until the Cup match with Gryffindor. "I haven't wanted to say anything about your focus this year."

"You don't need to, Rog," Cho smiled. "I know how rough the year's been, and how rough my play's been."

"At times."

"All right, at times. But I think everything's pretty much in place now. Saturday Ravenclaw gets the Cup back: your leaving present."

Roger slapped his forehead and pretended to moan. "Thanks for reminding me about my N.E.W.T.s; every owl my family's sent since Christmas has been on about the tests."

"I'm sure you'll do well."

"Just be sure about yourself; I'll worry about Roger."

As she briskly walked back to Hogwarts by herself, Cho's mind stayed in the train of thought it had been in for over a week:

Harry. I'll show you, Harry. I'll show you how good a Seeker I can be. I showed you in the Army how good a witch I can be; I made a Patronus. A Patronus, Harry! Only Granger did as much, and hers wasn't nearly as impressive as mine. And, Harry, I am going to play such a match on Saturday that you won't mind that Gryffindor loses; you'll come looking to congratulate me, and you'll tell me I was brilliant, and I'll see it, Harry, I'll see it in those brilliant green eyes. The light, Harry, the light that told me I wasn't just another witch to you, the light you must surely have seen in my eyes because you aren't just another wizard to me, you aren't even The Boy Who Lived because we all get to share that, because I meant what I said, Harry, I meant what I said under the misteltoe ...

xxx

"Right-o, Hogwarts, and welcome!"

The morning of 30 May was fine and clear, perfect for Quidditch. Cho was up early, as usual on a match day, but she was calm. Two nights earlier she'd been woken up by another nightmare (the one where she was in the maze with Cedric), but she'd slept soundly Friday night and felt perfect on Saturday morning.

She pulled back her hair into a ponytail, got dressed, went down to breakfast early and, as she had since early April, ate in the hospital wing with Marietta. She ate very little herself, which was normal for a match day, but she also spent a lot of the morning trying to talk Marietta into coming to the stadium to watch.

"It won't work!" Marietta shouted for the tenth time. "Raina's veil makes me look like a fool, the beekeeper's bonnet makes me look like a fool, and I'm damned if I'll wear them both at the same time!"

Cho knew that already, but was running out of suggestions. Pomfrey had already tried every possible remedy she knew; she'd even asked Snape whether he could come up with something, but he proclaimed himself as perplexed as the others.

"Some spells leave a signature of their creator," Snape pronounced after examining Marietta, "but this one does not. If it was done by a student, that student is brilliant but also cold and spiteful. I trust a word to the wise is sufficient." After he spoke those words, he glared at Cho and Marietta, as if he knew that Cho know what it was all about.

Marietta decided to stay in the hospital wing. "Well, then, I'll just have to smuggle in some treats from the victory party," Cho smiled as she gathered herself to go to the stadium.

"Don't know how much of a party mood I'll be in," Marietta muttered. "Final exams are Monday, and there's still a colossal lot for me to recall."

"Well, we'll help each other there, too, of course," Cho said on her way to the door. "Please try to feel better, Marietta. It looks to be a glorious day!"

She had actually stayed a bit late and had to dash back to Ravenclaw. She met the rest of the team in the Common Room; like her, they all seemed relaxed--except for the Fifth-Years facing their O.W.L.s on Monday.

Cho seemed the happiest of the lot--happier than she'd been since Cedric was killed. She chatted on with the team about anything and everything as they prepared to go out onto the pitch as Lee called their names.

As they lined up, Roger turned back to Cho: "Listen, you haven't been Cheer-Charming yourself again, have you?"

Before Cho could answer, they heard Lee Jordan:

"And here's the team from Ravenclaw: Davies! Bradley! Chambers! Becksnee! Jenkins! Millbanks! And Chang!"

They marched out onto the pitch, the sun high in a clear sky, a light breeze pulling at Cho's hair. She felt as if the match had already been won.

"I'm serious," Roger muttered as they prepared to mount their brooms. "I haven't seen you like this lately."

"Roger," Cho laughed, "we're playing a team with a novice Seeker, two replacement Beaters and a hopeless Keeper. Maybe you should tell me why you're worried!"

"Because this is still Quidditch," Roger said, "and anything can happen."

They kicked off the pitch and into the air, Hooch blew the whistle, and...

"Davies takes the Quaffle immediately." Jordan sounded less than interested in announcing the match. Understandable; he was a Gryffindor, and seeing Ron Weasley as Keeper probably gave him indigestion. But then, others said Jordan had been pining ever since the Weasley twins made their dramatic exit.

Roger eluded the Gryffindor Chasers handily and shot the Quaffle through the ring for the first score of the match, all in the first minute of play.

This will be perfect, Cho thought. Just let Roger run up the score a bit, do some basic Seeking, just to make sure the Other Weasley doesn't see the Snitch first, which isn't too likely, then grab it and end it and get the Cup back for Ravenclaw. I wonder if it would be too much to hang onto the Snitch and actually give it to Harry...

As she thought it, she glanced at the Gryffindor benches.

There's Harry; he's standing up. He's making for the stairs.

He's leaving the match.

And Granger is leaving with him.

At that moment, the match was over. No matter how hard she tried, Cho couldn't keep her focus on the Snitch for more than a minute at a time. Her mind kept jumping: to the articles written last year by Rita Skeeter linking Hermione Granger romantically with Harry Potter, to the first meeting of Dumbledore's Army at the Hog's Head where Granger tried to run the show, to the scroll that they all had to sign--and to Marietta's face, now blighted for two months by that damned scroll, and to the Room of Requirement, where Harry and Hermione were probably headed at this very moment, a Room which might have another sprig of misteltoe hanging from the ceiling now, or--worse--a day-bed...

Stop that! Cho scolded herself. I can't let myself fret about that now. Get the Snitch or die trying; I'm a Seeker, and that's what a Seeker does...

Cho glanced at the scoreboard and almost stopped dead in mid-air. Ravenclaw was in the lead, but only by 60 to 40! The impossible has happened: Ron Weasley had figured out how to be a Keeper, and he kept turning back shot after shot by Ravenclaw.

Have to end this now, she thought, as she rose up, trying to find the Snitch, not even caring where the Gryffindor Seeker was. She looked, thought she saw something, kept looking, turned back... There it was, hovering above the center of the pitch.

She turned and went into a dive straight for the Golden Snitch, for the prize that would end the match, give the Cup to Ravenclaw. The Snitch took off as Cho drew near, but she just put on more speed. No, you don't; today you're mine, and the game is mine, and--

A hand reached up into Cho's field of vision and plucked the Snitch out of the air just as she pulled within three feet of it.

"GRYFFINDOR'S GOT IT! GRYFFINDOR'S GOT THE SNITCH AND WINS THE CUP!!"

Cho screamed "NO!"; she could barely hear herself over the cheering of the crowd.

She hardly felt it as she settled onto the pitch. Ginny Weasley was ecstatic, jumping up and down and still holding the Snitch as she was mobbed by her teammates.

I should be holding that, Cho thought dully, and looked down at what she was holding: an old, worn-out, shabby, outdated Comet Two Sixty. With an angry shout, she hurled her broom to the grass and ran from the pitch, tears burning her eyes.

xxx

to be continued in part 29, wherein Cho is confronted by Madam Hooch, confronts Roger, and finds that her feelings about Michael Corner are unexpectedly changing ... 


	5. Chapter 29 Strange Yet Familiar

OR DIE TRYING: CHO CHANG'S SIXTH YEAR

By monkeymouse

NB: JKRowling built the Potterverse; I'm just redecorating one of the rooms. And one of the great things about JKR telling the story from Harry's point of view is that stuff could be happening all over Hogwarts that Harry isn't aware of.

Rated: PG

Spoilers: Everything

xxx

29. Strange Yet Familiar

(talks with Hooch after the match; argues with Roger about whether he ever cared for her; approached by Corner; they talk about brooms, but he seems concerned about her, and his self-assurance makes him seem mature despite his age, and she finds herself wondering about Michael)

Cho didn't even go to the changing room; she ran back to the castle, desperate to get there before anyone could call her name, or try to talk to her. She didn't want to talk to anyone, didn't want to hear what anyone had to say.

Nobody but herself, and now her own mind was screaming at her.

Stupid! Stupid, stupid cow! You knew better than that before you even got your Hogwarts letter! You dropped your concentration, you dropped your guard, and you dropped the Cup!

Even as she ran and berated herself, she tried to think of a place where she could just hide until this awful day was oversomewhere she wouldn't have to answer questions, wouldn't have to apologise to the rest of Ravenclaw. Yet she realized that she couldn't hide in the library; with exams starting on Monday, the library would be full of students all weekend. And by now Umbridge has probably put some sort of lock on the Room of Requirement...

NO! Not there!

She knew, even if she couldn't say it yet, that she also wanted to avoid anyplace where she might see Harry Potterwith or without Hermione Granger. She no longer knew what to think about those two, except that, whatever happened between her and Harry or even if nothing happened between her and Harry, Cho would not forgive Hermione until Hermione forgave Marietta.

There was nothing for it. Cho would go to her dormitory, crawl under the covers, draw the bed curtains, and hide there. She'd probably go down to the hospital wing in the afternoon...

By the time she reached the tapestry, she was almost too winded to give the password ("ichneumon"). She staggered more than walked toward the bookcase, touched her copy of Confucius, and entered the Common Room...

...where Madam Hooch was waiting for her.

Cho froze on the spot, and could barely get out the words, "How ... did you..."

"Get in? Being on faculty does have its privileges."

Cho shook her head. "How did you know to find me here?"

"Frankly, it was a guess. I was prepared to wait here all afternoon, though, if I had to."

For the first time in her life, Cho understood what it meant to feel deflated; she truly felt as if whatever had been holding her up had all leaked out. She crumpled into the nearest seat. "Just get it over with, then."

"Not here and now. Follow me, please, Miss Chang." Hooch led Cho out of Ravenclaw, then up the stairs to the fourth floor. She stopped at the first door on the right, which Cho recognised as an Ancient Runes classroom. Hooch waited by the open door until Cho walked numbly inside, then closed the door behind them.

"You can go ahead, Madam Hooch."

"And do what yell at you? Call you all sorts of names for a badly-played match? You don't need two people doing that."

"Two people?"

"I expect you haven't stopped yelling at yourself since Weasley got the Snitch, so why should I bother?"

Cho's legs finally gave out under her and she slipped onto a bench, but it was out of surprise more than dread.

Madam Hooch answered her unspoken question: "You think you're the first Seeker in a thousand years of Quidditch to lose a game like that? I've been here for a few years, you know, and I've seen the best and the worst and just about everything in between." She smiled as she sat opposite Cho. "Do you want to talk about it?"

Even as she recalled her trip to Cambridge, where the grief counsellor encouraged her to talk, she also remembered Madam Puddifoot's, and the disaster of trying to talk with Harry Potter. "I'm not sure it'll help..."

"Is it what I expect it is, or is something else going on?" Hooch pressed.

"It's..." She tried but stopped, then tried again. "I..." Cho knew that she'd have to get the words out, if only to repay Madam Hooch for standing by her all these years. "Something got between me and the match. I couldn't focus. The one match where I really needed to focus, and I couldn't."

"Just a little thing called pressure. We grownups feel it a hundred times a day, more or less. Takes a lot of the fun out of life, I can tell you."

"But I let you down, and the House, and the team." Cho paused. "And myself. I thought I was a better Seeker than that."

"On a good day, you certainly are, and I've seen you on enough good days to know that. You're the best Seeker at Hogwarts right now. Summerby would need to work more years than he has left at Hogwarts to come up to your level, and Malfoy is dangerously close to doing himself in with his dirty tricks."

"And..." She couldn't even say his name.

"Gryffindor? Well, Angelina Johnson tells me that Ginny Weasley would rather be a Chaser next year anyway, and there's simply nobody else while Potter's on the bench. And I'm sure Umbridge will keep him there as long as she's around."

"Pardon me for saying this, but..." Cho's voice dropped to a whisper. "I wish something would happen to her."

"You're not alone in that wish." Madam Hooch stood up. "Well, I'm sure we just broke an Edict or two, so maybe we'd better move along."

Cho actually smiled as she stood up, for the first time since the match. It seemed her world wasn't going to explode after all.

"Although I will say this," Madam Hooch said as she walked with Cho into the corridor. "Next year will be your last chance, probably your only chance, to go head-to-head with Potter again. I'd like to see that."

"I ... I've never really had the chance," Cho said, no longer sure how she felt about that prospect.

By Wednesday evening Cho wasn't even thinking of Quidditch at all, much less facing Harry Seeker to Seeker. The exams were on, and for Sixth Years they seemed to be N.E.W.T.-level already. Cho and Marietta spent almost every spare moment in the hospital wing studying. Some subjects, like Binns' History of Magic, were simple: read the book and repeat what it says. Ancient Runes and Arithmancy involved quite a lot of practice, just to make sure everything was done in order.

Cho had just finished the Wednesday afternoon exam in Potions, which was devilishly tricky. But then, the Ravenclaws expected no less from Snape, so they prepared by seeking out the oldest, most obscure potion formulas they could find, on the off-chance that Snape would assign them. And, sure enough, he did: they were told to mix up a batch of Linguafranca, which would temporarily give animals the power of speech, and test it on a cage full of owls Snape had brought down from the Owlery for the purpose. Cho's year succeeded, but the owls said such insulting things about Hogwarts in general, and Argus Filch in particular, that Cho wondered whether the owls might not be slaughtered after the exam, just in case.

She especially worried when one old horned owl started to complain: "And I resents havin' to be diverted just so that Umbridge woman can read..."

"Hush up!" a screech owl cut him off. "You don't want it to get back to her, now do yeh?"

Of course, by then, it was an open secret that Umbridge and the Inquisitorial Squad had been reading the student correspondence entering and leaving Hogwarts. After the business with Harry's interview in the Quibbler, Cho had continued writing to her family in Mandarin, just as Raina wrote home in Farsi, in hopes that Umbridge would consider the letters not worth the bother of translation.

Cho went from Snape's classroom to Ravenclaw, dashed off a quick scroll to her mother about the exam, then remembered that she had sent Quan Yin home the night before. Rather than wait, she went to the Owlery and attached the message to a school owl.

As she watched it fly toward the south, she heard the door open and close behind her. She turned, half dreading and half hoping to see Harry Potter

it was Roger Davies.

Cho had avoided him since they lost the Cup; now that she was cornered, she tried to act as if it had never happened. "How are the N.E.W.T.s treating you?" she smiled.

"That's why I'm here; just sending home the daily progress report." He selected a medium-sized horned owl and tied a short scroll to its leg. "It could be worse, I suppose," he said, looking at the owl's leg and not at Cho. "I'm just looking to scrape by, after all. It's not as if the N.E.W.T.s are going to determine my future."

"Well, that's usually the way it works for the rest of us."

"Not for me." He walked the owl to the window, watched him fly away, then turned toward Cho, smiling. "I've got a tryout."

"Really! Roger, that's wonderful! I'm so happy for you. Which team?"

He made a sour face. "Ballycastle. Honestly, why couldn't it have been a Welsh team? Now I have to go up to Northern Ireland!"

"But you wouldn't say no if they offered, would you?"

"Everybody's got to start somewhere. Anyway, after a few years, I might get traded. Things always work out for the best."

"Do you really believe that, Rog?"

"Yeh; I do now, anyway." The look on his face had turned serious. Not stern or angry, but more earnest and grave than Cho had ever seen him.

He stood, looking seriously at Cho, waiting, as if she was supposed to ask him something.

"Roger, listen," Cho started nervously, not at all sure where the conversation would take her, "I heard that you had words with some students who were making fun of me, after that awful business in Hogsmeade. I want to thank you for that..."

"Don't." The way he snapped that answer out at Cho, and the serious look still on his face, made Cho think he was mad at her. "Just standing up for a friend. You'd know about that."

"You mean Marietta? Yes, she's a friend, and also a Prefect."

"What's wrong with her face, then?"

"II don't know."

"Somehow, I think you really do know."

"Look, it's just a stupid fight, a girl thing between two Houses that should have been long over. Can't we just drop it?"

"That's funny coming from you."

"And what's THAT supposed to mean?"

"You never drop nothin'! Cedric's been dead a year and you haven't dropped him. You had that big row with Potter, and you still haven't dropped him, either!"

"What could that possibly matter to you! To you and Annabella Smoot! That was quite a show you two put on. Are you taking her with you to Ballycastle?"

"Damn it all, Cho, II sent it."

"Sent what?"

"Three years ago. You got a Valentine."

"What?"

"A poem."

Cho's brain felt as if it were freezing solid, refusing to cooperate. "Lockhart was... those ugly little dwarves..."

"And one of those ugly little dwarves had a poem I wrote. Well, I cribbed some of it from a Muggle. It was a poem about China and I thought..."

"I never heard it."

"Never?"

Cho shook her head. "Pince Transfigured it before I could hear it."

"So youyou never knew?"

Cho sat heavily onto the Owlery floor, not noticing the rodent bones and owl droppings. Her entire Hogwarts history was re-arranging itself. "Roger, oh, Roger, oh no..."

"Cho, I, I didn't mean to blurt it out like that"

"HowHow am I supposed to believe you! When I tried to join the team you actually warned me off! You said Quidditch and romance don't mix. And now you say you were interested in me, even while you were with the Veela, I suppose"

"A Veela's a Veela. I couldn't help that!"

"Annabella Smoot is no Veela!"

"Look, if you're going to be jealous of anyone, go back to the Veela!"

"But you just said!"

"Listen to me!" Roger crouched down next to where Cho was still sitting on the floor. "All right, she played with me during the Tournament, and I liked it. I mean, I thought about all the other wizards she could have had. Yeh, I acted the fool, but it was only me, nobody else, and I still feel proud that she picked me. So I've written her all this year. She's answered a few times, although she's been working at Gringotts in London with one of the older Weasleys." He looked at a tiny mouse pelvic bone on the floor and flicked it away. "They do more than work together, from what I hear.

"But I wrote to her after you said you were waiting for Potter to ask you to Hogsmeade. I still remember her reply. She wrote back, 'Love is a little more complicated than you English make it, but also it is more simple. It makes no sense to hope when you will get nothing for it. You must walk away.'"

Tears began to roll down Cho's face. She tried to think of Roger as a friend all of these years; she either didn't know, or didn't want to know, if she caused him any pain.

"So I took Annabella to Puddifoot's to see if she was right, and she was. We saw each other for a month, had a few good snogs in the meantime, then she lost interest. And when it was over, it didn't hurt; not much, anyway."

Roger stood back up; Cho stayed on the Owlery floor, crying. Roger stood up, bent over, with one finger under her chin raised Cho's head up to face him, and lightly kissed her forehead.

"I'll still think of you as a friend," he said softly, "as well as the best damned Seeker I know. As for the rest, well, the Muggles have a saying: You can't miss what you never had." With that he turned and walked out of the Owlery. As Roger walked down the stairs to the castle, he thought, And I'll bet it's crap when the Muggles say it, too.

Cho was too exhausted to move. She stayed on the Owlery floor for twenty minutes. Then she got up, carelessly brushed off her robes, and slowly went down to the hospital wing. She knew that she'd hate repeating all this to Marietta, but what else was there to do?

xxx

The next Saturday, exactly one week since the loss to Gryffindor, Cho woke up to a day in which, for the first time in ages, there was absolutely nothing to do. No exams to prepare for, no matches to practice for. She could do anything.

And the prospect was upsetting. You don't want to hear that you can do whatever you desire, when the things you truly desire are impossible.

She wanted Marietta's face fixed once and for all, so that she could come out of the hospital wing and enjoy the weather and not have to go about the castle with veils and masks and makeup, none of which disguised the vile word SNEAK. But that wouldn't happen until Hermione Granger felt some remorse. I daresay she's proud of having pulled off such a spell, Cho thought, at least to hear Harry tell it...

Harry.

She wanted Harry. She wanted to be able to talk to him again, to have him talk to her again, without Granger's hex and Marietta's face getting in between them. But, no; Marietta DID try to tell Umbridge about the DA, and he seemed unlikely to forgive that.

She wanted Cedric back from the dead, which seemed somehow only slightly less impossible than a contrite Granger or a forgiving Potter.

She wanted this awful, awful year to be over. She wanted it to be 1 July and all of them on the train to London now, instead of almost a month from now.

She went down to the hospital wing, found that Marietta was still asleep, and curled up in the neighbouring bed. She wanted to wait a few minutes, but instead dozed off and slept for two hours. When she awoke, Marietta was already up.

"Good thing," the Prefect smiled; "we almost missed breakfast altogether."

By the time they got to the Great Hall, it was almost empty, with one or two students lingering at each House table. Most of the students were out enjoying the good weatherexcept for the Fifth Years, whose O.W.L.s were only half over.

Cho looked at the far end of the table, where she saw Michael Corner dividing his attention between a bowl of porridge and a copy of the "Most Potente Potions."

"That's funny," Cho said; "somehow I thought he was Fourth Year."

"I can understand why," Marietta replied between bites of sausage. "Ginny Weasley's Fourth Year, and they've been an item for months."

Ginny Weasley was still a very sore spot for Cho. "And he's a Ravenclaw? Surely he can do better."

Cho stayed in the hospital wing with Marietta until lunch, when Madams Pomfrey and Sprout showed up with another experimental potion to try on Marietta's face. Cho knew she had to leave, but promised to return in a couple of hours.

Once in the corridor, though, she had no idea where to go.

A shout came through an open window. She looked out on the courtyard, and saw a couple of Gryffindor boysone black, one whitere-enacting the dramatic departure of the Weasley twins. Even though they risked being given detention (or worse) by Umbridge, they seemed to be enjoying themselves immensely.

That's what I want to do, Cho suddenly realized: fly. Not for a match, not for practice. Just flying for its own sake. Just feeling the sun and wind...

Then she remembered. Last week, the last she'd seen of her Comet Two Sixty was when she angrily threw it to the ground after the match. What happened then? Did Hooch pick it up and put it in the shed?

Remembering that gesture made her feel every bit as rotten as she did whenever she thought about Puddifoot's. She walked briskly back to Ravenclaw, resisting the urge to break into a run, as if she could escape her embarrassment that way. But by the time she reached the tapestry, she was remembering Roger Davies, and what the Veela had told him: sometimes you must walk away.

Perhaps a new broom...

She looked around the Common Room and found what she was hoping to find: the most recent edition of "Which Broomstick." Some of the pages had been folded down, and there was scribbling in some of the margins. Next to a picture of the 1996 model Twigger, someone had written "Call it Snigger; it's a joke!" Other comments were considerably ruder.

Still, she realized that she wasn't really aware of the state of the broommaker's art, so she settled into the daybed and began leafing through the pages.

An hour later, she was still casually leafing through the book.

"Hello, Cho."

Michael Corner.

Cho fought a quick internal battle. Would she despise him because of Ginny Weasley? Or would she be friendly to a fellow Ravenclaw and a member of the DA? Cho's personality, all other things being equal, tended toward friendly.

"Taking a break from studying?"

He nodded. "The worst of it is over, at least. I mean, we only have four days next week. Potions on Monday, but after that it's a doddle." He pointed at her book. "It's high time you got something better than the Comet."

Cho's eyes narrowed as she looked at him. "Strange thing to say, coming from the boyfriend of the winning Seeker."

Michael rolled his eyes. "Don't remind me; that's over."

Cho was surprised to realise how interested she was to hear that. "Since when?"

"Since lunch, actually. You can't imagine what Ginny's been like this past week. She's been nothing but 'I won the Cup' and 'I beat the Ravenclaw Seeker.' So I tell her that I'm still Ravenclaw and she says, 'Too bad you weren't smart enough to get into Gryffindor,' and that's when we went at it. We exchanged a few ill-chosen words, and she gave me my walking papers."

"Oh." Cho didn't really know what to say. "You don't look too broken-up about it."

"We'd been seeing too much of each other, I think. Sometimes you just have to move on."

Cho looked down at the catalogue, afraid that her eyes would betray her thoughts if she looked at Michael's face. Why did he use those words?

"Enough of that. Have you decided on anything?"

"What? Oh, no; not really." Michael seemed poised to go, either up to his dorm or out of the Common Room and into the castle. Cho hardly realised that she was speaking: "Do you have any thoughts?"

Michael pulled a chair up next to the day bed and sat down with a smile. "Thought you'd never ask. What are you looking at?"

"What? Oh, well, I'm going through the import models just now. Do you know anything about this American import, the Soft-tail Deluxe?"

"I know it's not the broom for you. All the American models have too much power, and none of the control spells are sensitive enough."

"Don't you think I can handle it?"

"Only if you had about a year to get used to it. At high speed in the middle of a match, you'd build up too much momentum and end up in the stands."

"What do you recommend, then?"

Michael looked Cho up and down, in a way that left her feeling not unpleasant. "In your case, I'd look at some of the Japanese brooms."

"This isn't a racial thing, is it?"

"Never! Just that the Jap brooms are built for someone like you; they're smaller, far more flexible, built for maximum speed with perfect control. Most British wizards think they'd fall apart in a high breeze, but there's a lot of strength there most wizards don't see at first glance."

Something about Michael's conversation, his smile, his way of looking at Cho, felt strange yet familiar at the same time. She tried to push it back in her mind; the subject at hand now was brooms. Later, in the hospital wing, she'd discuss him with Marietta.

"Any thoughts, Mister Corner?"

"Well, ever since they brought it out I've been partial to the Interceptor..."

Cho and Michael talked about brooms for the next two hours. By the time he left to resume studying for Potions, Cho had forgotten about her promise to return to the hospital wing.

xxx

to be continued in part 30, wherein Cho finds out one thing too many about Michael Corner ... 


	6. Chapter 30 Letting It Happen

OR DIE TRYING: CHO CHANG'S SIXTH YEAR

By monkeymouse

NB: JKRowling built the Potterverse; I'm just redecorating one of the rooms. And one of the great things about JKR telling the story from Harry's point of view is that stuff could be happening all over Hogwarts that Harry isn't aware of.

Rated: PG-13

Spoilers: Everything

xxx

30. Letting It Happen

"We were talking about brooms, and he was recommending this Japanese model, and he said the broom had a lot of strength most people wouldn't see at first glance. And I don't know, but something about the way he looked straight at me when he was saying that, it made me think he was complimenting me and not the broom."

After a few seconds studying Cho, all that Marietta said in reply was, "Michael Corner, eh?"

"Is there some sort of problem?"

"First Potter, now another Fifth; you're turning into a right cradle-robber."

"Hardly. Harry can be so immature--growing up the way he did, poor thing, he can't help it. But Michael just seems, I don't know, older, somehow. More confident, anyway, more self-assured, and maybe that makes him seem older."

"Sounds as if you've made your mind up already."

"Oh, anything but! It's just that, well, I never considered the possibility before."

"And now it's---"

"Possibly possible. See you in the morning, then."

Cho was halfway to the door of the hospital wing when Marietta called out: "Cho!" She turned. "I hope this one works out for you."

"I guess I do too." With that, she went up to Ravenclaw.

xxx

Sunday, 7 June, was just another lazy end-of-term Sunday for most of Hogwarts. There was still four more days of O.W.L.s for the Fifth Years, though. The library tables were still piled high with books, and small knots of students discussed fine points of magic in the Ravenclaw Common Room, and, Cho supposed, in the other Houses as well.

She had slept in, skipped breakfast, and was passing through the Common Room to have lunch with Marietta when Michael waved her over from a large stack of books on a small table. He and two other Fifth Years were preparing.

"Potions tomorrow," he shuddered.

"At least Snape won't be there," Cho nodded.

"There's half the battle won right there," Michael smiled.

"Tell me how it went, will you?"

"Of course." Michael's smile got just a touch wider. "I'll meet you in the Great Hall and tell you during dinner."

"Sounds good. Erm, I'd better let you get back, then."

Cho almost ran out of the Common Room. She knew exactly what had brought on her case of nerves. She wanted to tell Marietta about it, but when she got to the hospital wing, she found that she couldn't bring herself to do so over lunch. It wasn't until after dinner that Cho mentioned Michael to Marietta.

Cho waited until the dinner dishes cleared themselves. "Erm, Marietta, I might not be having dinner here tomorrow night."

"Oh? Is there someplace secret you're supposed to be?"

"No secret at all. It's just that I'm meeting Michael Corner in the Great Hall during dinner. The Potions O.W.L. will be over by then, and I wanted to ask him..."

Marietta smirked. "Making it official so soon? You don't let the wolfsbane grow under your feet."

"Nothing's official! It's not even a date; more like an appointment. I just want to..."

"Just want to stop eating all your meals in the hospital wing."

"It's not that, Marietta!"

"Look, Cho, I don't blame you a bit. Everyone said they'd fix my face up in a minute or an hour or a day, and here it's been two bloody months. I'm forgetting that I ever lived in Ravenclaw."

"Honestly, it's nothing to do with you or the wing. It's just, well, I ..."

"You what?"

"Look, we may be Ravenclaw, and we may be clever, but, clever or not, I know that every one of us thinks about love or romance or, or call it whatever you like. Unless, of course, you've never..."

Cho left the sentence hanging in the air. Marietta looked at her hands rather than at Cho. After a minute she muttered, "Guilty as charged."

"There it is. I don't need details if you don't want to share them, but my point is that we all think about these things. I certainly thought about it even before Cedric came along. And you know how that's turned out this year: all sad reminders and shrieking nightmares. And then I loved Harry after Cedric." Cho paused, then lowered her own voice. "The truth is, I loved Harry before Cedric as well. But I kept it to myself for too long, and the result is, well, you know. Marietta, I still feel the need for something romantic in my life. Harry may be a lost cause now, but I want to get on with some boy without him or me or both of us making a total hash of everything! Can you see that?"

Even though Marietta was smiling, her eyes were filling with tears. "Actually, this is the best news I've heard from you in a long time. I don't mind giving you up for a meal or two." She looked at Cho a minute. "At least I'm not losing you to a Slytherin."

"Bite your tongue!"

They both laughed.

xxx

Monday night, Cho was down early to dinner, waiting by the large doors to the Great Hall. She could hear the furniture rearranging itself back into the House tables. The noise continued right up to the stroke of five, when the doors opened and revealed the Great Hall, as it was supposed to be.

Although Cho had grown accustomed over the years to sitting toward the middle of the table, she sat down at the end closest to the doors. Perhaps she wanted to make sure that she saw Michael, or was seen by him. Perhaps she still had trouble sitting near Housemates she had once counted as friends, yet who failed to help her through her problems this year. Cho thought for a minute about why she'd done what she did, then gave it up as Michael entered the Hall.

"Well, then," she greeted him smiling, "it didn't kill you after all. I saved you a place," and she pointed to the side of the table across from her. It was as if she was saying that he could sit near her but not next to her--not yet, anyway.

If any of this gave Michael pause, he didn't show it, and sat down across from Cho with an exaggerated sigh of relief, as food appeared immediately in front of them. "Wasn't as rough as I thought it would be, mainly because Snape wasn't in the room."

"I remember feeling that way last year," Cho smiled. "So, what happened?"

"The written part in the morning wasn't too bad; all out of books, anyway. Afternoon was a bit tricky. We first had to whip up a Scintillation Solution--the short-term one, not the long term. So anyone who got them confused and put in knotgrass instead of fluxweed added an hour to the cooking time, which was their bad luck. Because, after the Solution, we also had to run off one other potion. If they asked you for it last year, it would've been dead easy."

"What do you mean by-- Did they ask for that again? The Iron Stomach potion?"

Michael nodded. "I expect the Ministry wanted to catch us out with an old Chinese potion that's pretty much obsolete these days. Anyway, I saw the ingredients included powdered Fireball eggshell, and I thought of you."

"Should I take that as a compliment?"

"Well, they fly and you fly."

Cho nibbled at her pork cutlet. This was an unexpected pleasure for her: dinner and a conversation. She suddenly felt that the year had gone by and that she'd missed so much of it.

"It's all one, anyway," Michael was saying with a mouthful of turnips. "I mean, I don't see what half of the classes we take have to do with Real Wizarding Life."

"You've had the Career Advisement, I take it?"

"Well, Flitwick chatted me up a bit, but, truth to tell, I haven't made any sort of plans at all. It's not exactly Wit and Learning, but I'll probably do nothing in Sixth Year, talk it over with my parents during Seventh Year and then see which way the wind is blowing."

Cho glanced around, then lowered her voice to make sure she wasn't overheard. "That may be the best policy, what with Voldemort still out there somewhere."

Michael's brow furrowed just a bit. "For my part, the jury hasn't come back on that one, no matter what Harry told the Quibbler. Anyway, enough about me. Have you chosen a career yet?"

"My parents have, of course. They want me in the family shoppe selling herbs, and maybe I'll do that a few years down the road. But it's not what I want to do."

"What's that, then?"

"Can't you guess, Mister Wit and Learning?"

Michael gave a low whistle. "You don't want much."

"Right in one, then."

"You do realize the odds are against you. I mean, there's only thirteen Quidditch teams in Britain. With Reserves, that's twenty-six Seeker spots that don't exactly open up every day."

"As long as there's one open, I think I have a good shot at it."

Michael raised his water goblet. "Well, you have the talent, and you certainly deserve it." He took a sip, then set the goblet down. "Anyway, what if there is no spot? Would you play in Europe?"

"If it comes to that, things are loosening up in China. The Fukien Fireballs still aren't sanctioned, but there's talk of forming a couple of other exhibition teams there. Anything can happen. I think it would be glorious to be part of that: opening up an entire nation to Quidditch!"

"Yeh, well, you'd be missed."

"Oh? By anyone I know?"

"You're a Ravenclaw; you figure it out."

The way Michael looked at Cho when he said that made her feel--well, she didn't really know how she felt. Fortunately, Luna Lovegood started laughing raucously at some joke or other a couple of feet down the table. That broke the spell.

"I'd, erm, better go see about Marietta."

"And tell her about me?"

"Won't know until I get there," Cho smiled. Before she left, though, she turned back to Michael. "Meet you here tomorrow night?"

"You're on," he smiled back at her.

Some Ravenclaw you are, Cho scolded herself as she walked to the hospital wing. You should be able to figure this out. When I was with Cedric it felt one way, when I was with Harry it felt a different way, and now talking with Michael leaves me feeling yet another way altogether! How am I supposed to know which feeling is real? They can't all be real, can they?

At that moment she reached the hospital wing. She decided not to discuss any of the various feelings with Marietta.

xxx

Cho knew that Michael would be studying most of the rest of the week. Even so, at dinnertime the next day she was again waiting to be first into the Great Hall. She sat at the end again, and once again Michael Corner came in and sat across from her.

"No problem at all with the Magical Creatures," he said as soon as he hit the bench. "After the beasts Hagrid had us working with, knarls and bowtruckles were dead easy. That, and sick unicorns."

"They didn't have a unicorn there, did they?" Cho interrupted.

"Nah, just a pile of ingredients, and you had to sort out what to feed a sick unicorn."

"So today was almost a day off for you, then."

"It'll seem like it tomorrow. Astronomy in the morning and at night, with Divination in the afternoon."

Now that she had a chance to observe Michael up-close for a second day, she realized why she had once mistaken him for Harry from the back. Both boys had a bushy head of black hair, but Michael's was naturally thick; Harry's looked thick, but it was merely perpetually disordered. But Michael's skin was also swarthier than most Hogwarts students; not olive-colour, but not far from it. He seemed to have a permanent suntan. "If you don't mind my putting it this way, you don't look like a Corner."

"I take after my mum; everyone says so who's met her. She's from Greece, you know."

"I didn't know, but I can see it in you."

"Came over to work for the Ministry, though it was years before she told me what. It was all rather hush-hush, to tell the truth."

"Have I heard of her?"

Michael rolled his eyes in mock despair: "I was afraid you were going to ask her name. Now I'll bet Sickles to Galleons you'll try for the next five minutes and not get her name right. Nobody ever does."

"I'll take that as a challenge. What is it?"

"Hecate Theototocopoulos."

Cho couldn't help it; between the extremely long name and the long face of the son of its owner, Cho started laughing.

"Not that funny," he muttered, although he too was smiling.

"I'm sorry, but--the poor dear."

"What 'poor dear?' It's no tougher back home for her than Cho Chang would be in China."

"Still, it's such a mouthful."

"Right, and you'll either master it in the next five minutes or give up entirely."

"It's Hecate Theotocopoulos."

"Nope, missed a syllable."

"Say it once more!"

"Sorry."

Cho started to laugh. "Hecate--that part's right, isn't it?" Michael nodded. "Theo ... Theocop ... No, wait, there's something there ... Theo-something-copoulos."

"Closer than most..."

"Don't distract me! Theo ... Theotocopoulos, but you said that's wrong." She threw up her hands. "I give up, then," she laughed.

"Come on, a good Seeker never gives up!"

"Well, if her name were a Snitch I'd have it in an instant, but ..." Cho suddenly stopped laughing.

"Something wrong?"

"Just that, well, I didn't get that last Snitch, at the finals."

"You shouldn't let that worry you one bit! Like I told Ginny afterward, there is still such a thing as beginner's luck. Besides, she'd rather be a Chaser next year anyway."

"Really?"

"Let's just leave Miss Ginevra Weasley out of the conversation, eh?"

"Yes, please. Back to your family; how did your parents meet?"

"At the Ministry. My dad worked for International Magical Law; he'd step across to her department if he got stumped on anything to do with Greece. After a while, they start meeting for lunch, and the grand result was me." Michael flashed that smile again: comforting, almost addictively so. "And what about the Changs?"

"A very, very long story. The short version is that they met in China and came to England just before I was born."

"Well, I definitely want to hear the long version someday, if only because that gives me an excuse to tell you some of the things my mum did back in Greece."

"She must have seen some very unusual things, then."

"Unusual enough; she wasn't much older than we are when she was active in the Resistance against Grindelwald."

Before he could say anything else, Torrance "Torture" Chambers stepped up.

"Hi, Cho. Sorry to break up the party, Michael, but the session starts in five minutes."

"Not to worry, I'll be there."

"Study session?" Cho asked as Chambers left the Great Hall.

"A study-group for the O.W.L.s; we're meeting tonight to go over Astronomy for tomorrow."

"You'll still be down to dinner tomorrow, though? The exam doesn't start until late."

"Even if the exam started at quarter past five, I'd still meet you down here. That's what you wanted to know, right?"

Even as Cho smiled and nodded, she thought: this is ridiculous. Why am I blushing?

"Tomorrow, then." Michael stood up, smiling, and left with a few other Fifth Year Ravenclaws.

He knew what I wanted to know, she thought; I wonder how well he really knows me. Maybe he can tell me what I want. Sometimes I feel so clueless ...

xxx

Wednesday was the third night in a row; Michael and Cho knew where "their spots" at the table were. Cho was in her spot as soon as the doors to the Great Hall opened. Michael strode quickly in about two minutes later. He sat down, and started grabbing dinner rolls and putting roast beef in them.

"Can't stay long tonight," he said, looking at Cho the whole time; he apparently could put his sandwiches together without looking at them. "I have to do some last-minute Astronomy studying."

"Is it that hard a subject?"

"There are just so many stars and planets and all to keep straight. How did you do it?"

"Well, I don't know now if I was better off or not, but I'd studied astronomy since I was a child. But then, I came to Hogwarts knowing all the stars and planets by their Chinese names. I had to keep both systems separate, for a start."

"Are they that different, then?"

"Oh, yes! Chinese astronomy tracks a select group of a hundred or so stars in transit through twelve Houses, as they're called. It's all part of the cycle of twelve years..."

"That have the animal names?"

"Exactly. But then, another cycle of five classic elements is overlaid on that, so the cycle really doesn't repeat itself for sixty years."

"They teach all this in Sixth Year Divination, right?"

The smile fell off of Cho's face immediately. "I have no idea."

Michael nodded. "Yeh, I remember now, right after the Tournament you challenged Trelawney. You mean you haven't been back to Divination since?"

Cho shook her head. "And I've no intention of going back, ever."

There was an awkward pause. Michael seemed to recover his humour first as he started stuffing his sandwiches into his pockets. "Hate to leave everything on that note, but I've got to dash. The moons of Saturn are still devilling me."

"I'm sure you'll do well," Cho half-smiled.

"Thanks. Anyway," Michael said as he stood up, "after Astronomy tonight we'll sleep in, then History is the last O.W.L."

"You'll come down tomorrow and tell me how they went?"

"Of course. It's nice having someone to talk to about all this."

"Yes; erm, yes, it is." Cho again felt herself blushing, and she wasn't quite sure why. Michael may have noticed, but have no sign, just turning to give Cho a cheery wave as he walked out of the Great Hall.

xxx

When Cho woke up on the morning of the eleventh, she could tell something was amiss. She sensed it in the air, like a fireworks from the Weasley twins. She parted the bed curtains and saw Diana Fairweather putting on her robes. She looked agitated; not at all her usual state.

"Diana, what's going on?"

"Nobody knows what's going on, and that's the damned trouble."

Cho slipped into slacks and a light pullover, then ran barefoot downstairs to the Common Room. A dozen Ravenclaws, mostly boys, were shouting at each other, trying to make some point or other. One of the boys was Chambers; she tapped him on the shoulder.

"What's happened?"

"Someone attacked McGonagall last night!"

Cho feared the worst. "Was it Death Eaters?"

"If so, then they're growing a strange crop of Death Eaters this year, because one of them was Umbridge."

It felt like a fist had reached in and grabbed Cho's brain, to stop it from working. "It ... No, it's not possible!"

"We all saw it from the Astronomy Tower, during last night's exam."

"But ... Why? Why McGonagall?"

"She just got in the way. Umbridge and her lot were after Hagrid. Stunned by half a dozen wizards and he still walked away; well, ran away is more like it. He's still hiding out in the forest, I think, but McGonagall rushed out to stop it and got hit by four Stunners. Last anyone heard, they took her to the hospital wing."

Those words seemed to free Cho from her spell. She dashed out of Ravenclaw and to the hospital wing.

Cho didn't know what she'd see there; she half-expected to see Umbridge or her companions, or other faculty or students. This was clearly an attempt by Umbridge to settle old scores. But there was nobody in the wing but Marietta, sitting up in bed, staring down at her hands as if she'd never seen them before.

"I hear there was some excitement," Cho said, hoping that Marietta could fill in the blanks.

Marietta didn't seem to hear at first. After a few seconds, she turned to Cho. "They didn't get you, then. I half expected they would."

Cho pulled up a chair. "Tell me now; tell me everything."

"Well, I don't know everything, but it all started around midnight. There was this commotion, and people are getting put in beds down at the other end. I feigned sleeping so I could watch it all. Flitwick Locomotored McGonagall in here first, and the way he was crying you'd think he feared for her life. He was shouting at Pomfrey: 'Four! Four Stunners!' Then a bunch of wizards Locomotor in three more, all unconscious and badly beaten. No spellwork there. They're put in beds on the other side of the aisle from McGonagall, who's behind the screens now.

"Then Umbridge comes in, and Flitwick goes completely to pieces. He screams at umbridge: 'If anything happens to her, it will be on your head!' So then Umbridge turns to Flitwick, cold as ice, and says, 'The attempted arrest of Rubeus Hagrid was a Ministry-sanctioned operation. She tried to interfere in something that was none of her business, and was accidentally injured.' Well, Flitwick exploded then. 'Four Stunning Spells at once is no accident! Your people tried to kill Hagrid and McGonagall!' 'These wizards carrying out orders from ther Ministry didn't come by their injuries by accident, and assault charges will be levelled against Hagrid when he's found and arrested. Meanwhile, I've arranged for mediwizards to see to Professor McGonagall, and that should be the end of the matter for tonight. Unless you have something you wish to tell me about Hagrid.' 

"She turns on that sick little sweet smile of hers, and she's basically telling Flitwick to make one false step so that she can mess about with him, too. Well, he holds his tongue after that, and she toddles out of the wing just as the mediwizards arrive. They look at McGonagall, and I hear them tell Pomfrey that they have to Apparate her to St. Mungo's, but that means taking her to Hogsmeade to do it. So, they take her out of the castle, with Flitwick following along behind."

Cho had been holding her breath. She, too, looked blank-faced as she waited to see if Marietta could tell her more. Finally, she sadly shook her head. "This is madness. Voldemort is attacking us, and we're attacking each other!"

"You haven't heard the worst of it."

"How can it be any worse?"

"The three other wizards all come around in about an hour's time. They were just beat up by Hagrid. And they were from the Ministry. I recognized one of them, named Dawlish, from that time I got dragged to Dumbledore's office, when this happened." She gestured vaguely toward her face. "When they all left, Pomfrey comes by and sits on my bed. She seems so sad and somber, I'm afraid she's going to tell me I'm dying. Anyway, she says, 'Things are taking a terrible turn, and I shouldn't keep this from you.' Cho, I've had mediwizards come in every other week or so to look at my face, and try to do something about the jinx. Pomfrey told me that they weren't from St. Mungo's. They were from the Committee on Experimental Charms." Marietta dropped her voice to a whisper. "Weapons Division."

Cho had been waiting for a dramatic revelation; instead, she smiled.

"I thought you'd understand," Marietta said angrily.

"I'm sorry, but you just told me the Ministry is going after the enemy with killer pimples."

"Cho, use your head! It's not about the pimples! It's about this hex hanging on for two months now, and nobody knows how to undo it. It's about the encryption, the arithmancy. They want something that can't be undone."

Now Cho saw what had bothered Marietta. "Oh, dear. This is not good at all."

"And I've been sitting here for hours trying to figure out what to tell my mum. The Ministry has been telling us the Death Eaters are the enemy, Dumbledore is the enemy, Potter is the enemy. What if it's the Ministry who's the enemy?"

Cho couldn't think of one aspect of life in the wizarding world that didn't touch on the Ministry of Magic. "First of all, don't tell your mother anything. Chances are they've already talked to her, and, if you admit that you know, they might trace it back to Pomfrey, and they'd come after her. As for the rest, well, there's just three weeks left to the term. Umbridge has finally gone too far to be ignored. They have to discipline her now. If she's still in the picture when we go back to London, then we think about doing ... something."

"But what?"

"We still have three weeks to worry about that," Cho smiled. "Do you feel up to some breakfast?"

xxx

The morning was quiet. With one more O.W.L. to take, things were far less tense than the week before, and especially calm around Ravenclaw. For the Fifth Years, even the droning narratives of Professor Binns and the daunting prose of "Hogwarts: A History" weren't such a challenge. Still, the Fifth Year Ravenclaws took it seriously enough that not one of them came down for lunch; they'd taken a quick bite of breakfast, then gone to their dormitories where they'd set up study groups. This would be the last chance before the exam.

Cho had eaten a larger-than-usual lunch of especially delicious chicken curry, came back to the Common Room, and set herself up in the bay window to reread Umfraville's "The Noble Sport of Warlocks". Between the book and the curry, she had nearly dozed off when she heard a commotion coming from the two sets of stairs leading to the dormitories. As if on a pre-arranged signal, the Fifth Years came thundering down both stairs, shouting like hooligans at a Quidditch match.

"They act like it's already over," muttered Vincent Krixlow, who was browsing for a book near the bay window.

"They're just warming up," Diana Fairweather said. "I heard them talking; they want to go out with a Weasley-sized bang."

Cho recognized Padma Patil from the DA, and "Torture" Chambers from the Quidditch team. When she saw Michael, she smiled and waved; Michael smiled and flashed her a thumbs-up before all the Fifth Years got swept out and toward the Great Hall.

xxx

Just as the doors opened at five, revealing the Great Hall back to its usual arrangement, Cho felt a tap on her shoulder.

"Michael!"

He stood there, beaming. "You don't look the worse for wear," Cho went on. "I suppose you did well."

"Perfect, more like. It was exactly what we expected: all the major treaties and goblin wars, and about half of the minor ones. Even finished it up with a few minutes to spare."

"Congratulations, then. Are you coming in?"

"Alas, no. I'm wanted back in the dorms. The year wants to, as the Muggles put it, party hearty. So we'll let the butterbeer flow tonight and sleep in tomorrow."

"Can't blame you for that," Cho chuckled. "So, when will I see you again?"

The question was out of Cho's mouth when she realized the double meaning it carried. Michael raised one eyebrow, but only said, "Saturday lunch, if you like. Only not in the Great Hall. I figure if the weather's nice we could pack a meal and eat by the lake."

"That's a wonderful idea! Meet you here at noon, then?"

"Noon it is; if I survive the party, that is. I'm off!" And he turned and headed back toward Ravenclaw.

Cho turned and walked into the Great Hall. She was lost in thought about Michael. She stayed that way even as she stopped by the hospital wing to look in on Marietta, and even as she went up to bed that night.

xxx

Friday morning, Cho woke up to hear her roommates chattering in surprise. She opened the bed curtains and saw Marietta, back at her four-poster. She was mobbed by the other Sixth Year girls, who were at least being polite enough not to mention the pimples that still spelled out the word "SNEAK"; they had gotten not one bit paler during her time in the hospital wing.

"It's not such a great mystery," Marietta was telling the others. "Pomfrey just said that two months was enough time with no change. I couldn't stay there any longer, and had to get out and face the world."

"So to speak," Diana interjected.

Raina clapped her hand over her mouth, stifling a laugh. She had caught Diana's pun, but was afraid it would be rude to laugh at it.

Cho simply started to get dressed. Then, as if by a signal, Marietta walked out of the dorm with Cho to go to breakfast.

As they walked down the stairs to the Common Room, Marietta whispered, "Not here and not now, but I've loads to tell you."

The Ravenclaw table lacked about a dozen students: the Fifth Years who had celebrated the end of their O.W.L.s until well past midnight. Cho and Marietta sat at the empty end, apart from the others.

No sooner did they sit on the benches than Cho asked, "What's this all about?"

Marietta took a quick glance to be sure she wasn't overheard. "Pomfrey woke me up just about dawn. She tells me, 'There's been...' and she stops. Probably realizes it's something she shouldn't tell me, whatever it is. She then says, 'I have some patients coming in, and I need all of the beds to be ready. In any event, you've been here two months with no change. You really should get back to your own dormitory.'"

Cho had been sipping a cup of tea. She set it down and leaned forward. "No explanation? In the middle of the night?"

"It's an explanation you want? Here's one; she makes me get dressed double-quick and all but pushes me out the door. As soon as I'm in the corridor and the door closes, I hear a couple of bangs, like Portkeys arriving. I can't make out any of the voices, but I hear steps along the corridor, so I hide behind a statue; the one of Miglich the Miserable. Down the corridor comes Flitwick, looking every bit as panicked as he did last night. Well, Pomfrey is talking as he opens the door, telling everyone to hush up, but then I hear Loony Lovegood inside the hospital wing call out, 'Good morning, Professor! Nice to see you!' As if it were a tea-party or something."

The strange events were just getting stranger. "Are you sure you heard two Portkeys?"

"Absolutely."

"Then let's see who's not here."

"Start at the Head Table, then."

Cho expected to see empty places for McGonagall and Hagrid, but--

"Where's Umbridge?"

"I'd bet every Galleon I have that she's in the wing."

"Why!"

"Retaliation for last night. I think some of the students got it into their heads to get revenge for McGonagall."

"That would be Gryffindor, then. But--" For the first time in months, Cho looked at the Gryffindor table; she'd deliberately avoided doing it after her argument with Harry. Harry was gone; Granger was gone; both Weasleys were gone. And one other; she remembered him from the DA but couldn't recall his name. He had that plant...

Cho turned back to Marietta. "But what about Lovegood? How does she fit into that? I didn't think she particularly liked McGonagall or the Gryffindors."

"But in November, for the first Quidditch match, she wore that stupid lion-head hat as a Gryffindor booster. And her father's newspaper did that interview with Harry Potter."

Cho nodded. It made a great deal of sense, especially because she knew what Marietta had forgotten: that the missing students were all in Dumbledore's Army. "So you think they all did something to Umbridge? She'd have had them arrested, not put in the hospital wing."

"Unless Umbridge was badly hurt herself! Maybe they gave her a few Stunning Spells to the chest."

Cho shook her head. "Look, most of us hate Umbridge, but Pomfrey wouldn't just wink at assaulting a Headmistress! It's got to be something else. We should just wait and see."

"Getting older and wiser, are you? Your sneaking into the wing days are over?"

"Second Year I did that," Cho smiled. "Seems like a different person did it now. So much has changed."

"Anything in particular?"

Cho looked down at her unused fork. As she stared at it, she tried to form the thoughts in her head. "The thing is, I--" She paused. "It's about Michael." Marietta nodded. "Well, I've been thinking. We've chatted a few times this week, and he seems nice enough, interesting. And, I, well, I don't actually want to say it out loud because my luck's been so rotten--"

"You think you want to be Michael Corner's girlfriend?"

Cho had never said the words before, and they sounded strange coming from Marietta. But the expression on the Prefect's face hadn't changed. Cho bit her lower lip, and blushed as she gave a quick nod.

"Nothing's been settled yet?"

"Saturday noon we're having lunch by the lake. I think, well, we may talk about it then."

Marietta nodded and buttered a piece of toast. "Just tell me everything that happens," she smiled.

xxx

After breakfast, Cho realized that she really should write to her mother about this. Like it or not, her mother would have to face the fact that someday Cho was going to ... what? Fall in love? She'd already done that. Get married? That was looking much too far ahead. What, then?

Cho sat staring at a blank piece of parchment for half an hour, trying to figure out exactly what she was writing home to say.

"Yeh okay, Cho?" It was Jan Nugginbridge, holding onto her Manx cat Coriander. Apparently they'd been outside having some fun on the lawn.

"Just trying to write to my mum."

"About you an' Corner?"

"There's really not much to say about us. We've just been talking..."

"Yeh, ev'ry night this week, nose ter nose. Yeh got ter admit it's differ'nt."

Cho didn't reply at first. Things had been strained between her and Jan this year, but she had relied on Jan's friendship in the past and it was always there for her. After a minute, she asked, almost too softly to be heard, "Jan, can I ask you something? How would you feel about it if I, well, started seeing Michael?"

"Well, for starters, yeh'd be back in th' right House."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Some of us have thought tha' yer troubles came from outside Ravenclaw. First a Hufflepuff, then a Gryffindor; some of us were a bit afraid o' the way things were goin'."

"The House never entered into it! Besides, didn't you hear anything Dumbledore said at the start of the year? The Houses need to learn to work together."

"Well, pardon me fer breathin' yer air, but yeh asked wha' I thought an' I tol' yeh. I didn't expect a bloody lecture on the state o' the world."

Cho took a deep breath. "You're right; I'm sorry. So, is that all you have to say; that he's in the right House?"

"Actually, yeh. Don't hardly know the lad."

Cho, suddenly feeling frustrated, put her quill and the scroll in a drawer. "Never mind. The words don't seem to be coming now, anyway."

Cho went outside for a while, but couldn't think of anything to do but sleep. She went back to the Common Room, pulled a book off the shelves almost at random, and leafed through it almost at random. She was just marking time until dinner. Saturday would be a much more important day.

xxx

The sun rose Saturday on what looked to be a perfect day. It should have been simple for Cho; it should have been the high point of an otherwise miserable year.

She stayed in bed most of the morning, feeling as if every butterfly in the Forbidden Forest had made its way into her stomach.

This is rubbish, she kept telling herself, as she got out of bed, took some clothes out of her wardrobe, and sat back down on the bed, the clothes in her lap. She made no move to put them on, she just looked at them, as if they were artifacts from an ancient civilization.

Why can't I-- She couldn't finish the thought, even to herself. The fact was, she had no idea exactly what she wanted to happen today.

Would Michael try to kiss her? Would she fall apart, as she did with Harry under the misteltoe? Or would his kiss return her to the fog she was always in when Cedric kissed her? Or what if--

Stop this! she finally scolded herself, after turning the possibilities over in her mind for an hour. Whatever is going to happen, let it happen.

It was a quarter past eleven when she started to get dressed. It was shaping up to be a warm and sunny day, so she decided on slacks and a loose-fitting light tunic that bared her arms only up to the elbow. It was an outfit she'd bought in Copenhagen last summer, so there was no association with Cedric, and it had never been warm enough to wear it anytime she was with Harry, so--

Stop making comparisons! Let it happen!

She was in the Common Room at quarter to twelve, but wasn't going to wait there for Michael. She felt she needed some sort of neutral ground, as it were. A reminder that this wasn't anything emotional. She walked toward the entrance to Hogwarts, but lingered on the second floor landing, coming downstairs only at a minute to twelve.

Michael showed up at two minutes after, carrying a covered wicker basket. "Lunch as promised," he smiled.

His smile was infectious; Cho returned it. "How'd you get that?"

"I chatted up that elf who came round to the--" He looked around at the students filing past them, going into the Great Hall for lunch. He lowered his voice: "To the DA. "Bit of a lunatic but very nice. Acted like he'd move heaven and earth if I asked."

"You didn't ask for too big a lunch, I hope."

"I think we can manage. Shall we?"

Michael and Cho walked out onto the steps under a blazing noonday sun. They proceeded across the lawn and around the shore of the lake. At one point they passed the area where the tents and bleachers had been set up for the Second Task of the Tri-Wizard Tournament. Cho, who had been talking about Dumbledore's Army with Michael now that they were sure they wouldn't be overheard, looked at the lake and fell silent.

Michael asked, "Was it strange being underwater like that?"

Cho hadn't expected the question; it startled her. "What? Um, to tell the truth, I don't remember anything that happened underwater. Dumbledore enchanted us all, you see."

"Ah. Wonder where he is, anyway?"

"Someplace safe, I expect."

"Listen, Cho, I'm sorry I brought it up. If you don't feel comfortable talking about that--"

"It's all right. It's been a long time since then. I should be used to it by now."

Only I'm not, Cho thought, as Michael pointed out a fallen log in a shady clearing that overlooked the lake. I'm down to only one nightmare a week, but I still have them. Maybe this is too soon.

No sooner did Cho sit on the log when she realized that there was no place for Michael to sit except in the dirt or on the log. A second later, he sat down at her right side.

Don't panic, she told herself. There's nothing happened yet, and probably nothing will. You've had a good time talking with him this week. Just let it happen.

Michael opened the hamper and produced Cornish pasties and a game hen, lightly seasoned and perfectly cooked, with two flasks of pumpkin cider. No plates or utensils, but none were needed, and indeed, eating in the clearing, facing the lake with the castle hidden from view by the trees, made the meal feel, not exactly uncivilised; what was the word Cho was looking for--

"Heard anything about Umbridge?" Michael asked through a mouthful of pasty.

"Last I heard was the attack on McGonagall."

"Well, nobody's seen hide nor hair-ribbon of the old bat since Thursday."

"I've, erm, heard a rumour that she's in the hospital wing."

"Hope so. Believe me, the worst the Weasley twins could have done to her is still too good. I hope Dumbledore gets back in for next year."

"I'm sure he will."

Michael took a long draw on his flask, set it back in the basket, and stretched his arms up and out. "This was a good idea, even if I do say so."

"Yes, it's lovely out here."

"Well, good weather's still worthless if you don't have good company." Michael reached back and rested his left hand on Cho's left shoulder. She flinched slightly, but didn't say or do anything else.

"Didn't mean to startle you," Michael went on, "but, well, this past week, having you to talk to, it's been really grand. I'm glad the way things have turned out."

In a voice Michael could barely hear, Cho whispered, "So am I."

"Funny how these things work out sometimes," Michael went on. "We're in the same House for years and never exchange five words. I guess it was just the right time to get to know each other better."

Again in a whisper, Cho answered, "Yes, I think you're right." She felt instinctively that Michael's next move would be to kiss her, and she was just about to turn her head to face him.

Michael's next move, however, was to let his hand slip off of Cho's shoulder, sliding down and cupping her breast.

A Seeker is expected to have quick reflexes, and Cho's were as quick as any young Seeker's could be. But, as she recalled what happened next, even she was surprised at the speed of her reaction. In a single, fluid movement as swift as thought, she drew her right arm up, elbowed Michael in the chest off the back of the log and onto the ground, stood up, drew her wand, and pointed it at Michael's throat. Her eyes blazed like a dragon's.

"DON'T! YOU! EVER! TOUCH! ME! AGAIN!"

Michael had his hands up at the level of his head, like in the Muggle movies when the bad guy surrenders. As he stood, the smile he wore never left his face. Except that, now, it looked more like a contemptuous sneer.

"Well," he said, "that was a week wasted. Maybe I'll go see if Ginny'll have me back. At least she knew how to have fun; she's alive. You're as dead as Diggory."

"GET OUT!"

Michael's smirk didn't change, but he raised one eyebrow. "Get out? We are out. And, if I'm not mistaken, I have as much right to be on the grounds as you do."

The anger was draining out of Cho; all she felt now was completely foolish. All she could think to do now was to turn and run around the lake back to the castle--taking the far side, avoiding the way they had come. She ran hoping at first that her tears, equally of rage and embarrassment and fear, would stop by the time she got to the castle. They hadn't stopped.

Cho ran instead to her dormitory, where she found Marietta playing a game of Snakes and Ladders with the Grey Lady. The snakes scattered in all directions and the ghost at first hovered, seeming sympathetic but not wanting to intervene without being asked. After a minute, Marietta shook her head, as if to say that her help wouldn't be needed, and she floated through the dormitory wall.

Cho howled out everything: the walk to the clearing, the words they'd said, Michael's grabbing of her, her reaction, his seeming scorn for her once she'd rejected him. And she told Marietta about the vagrant-looking Muggle who had tried to attack her in the British Museum several Christmases ago; the closest she had come to being raped, and she had only told one other soul about him before now.

Finally, she ran out of tears and words and emotions. She slumped off of the bed onto the stone floor, exhausted.

Marietta finally asked, "You're not going to blame yourself for this, are you?"

Cho wiped her eyes, ran her hand through her hair, and looked up at Marietta. "Why not? Maybe it's what I deserve."

"Stop that! It's nothing to do with you that Michael Corner turned out to be a right little ... can I call him a bastard?"

"You can and you should."

"And you should stop moping. None of it was your fault, or even bad judgment. You should do what my mum keeps telling me: put it on the shelf. Just get those thoughts out of your mind until you're out of Hogwarts. By then, you'll know what you really want out of life. I hate to see someone as lovely and talented as you down on yourself."

Cho simply sighed. "I'll never be able to; ever again." Marietta wasn't quite sure what Cho was referring to, but she was remembering the meeting of Dumbledore's Army where she had produced her Swan Patronus. Never again, she kept telling herself; I'll never be able to make another one.

I'll never be that happy, ever again.

xxx

The dawn of Sunday, June 14, brought even worse news for Cho Chang. As soon as she opened her bedcurtains, Marietta walked up to her, the Sunday edition of the Daily Prophet in hand.

"Cho," she said, "let me be the first to take back everything I may have said this year, or even thought, that you might be, well ..."

"Some kind of nutter," Diana Fairweather stood up from her writing-desk, also holding a copy of the Prophet. "I'm sorry, too. You were right all along."

"I, I don't understand."

"It's all in the paper," Raina said as she was putting on her robes.

"Here." Marietta handed her copy to Cho. As she read the large, bold headline, the letters seemed to be a cold metal fist grabbing her by the throat:

HE-WHO-MUST-NOT-BE-NAMED RETURNS

Cho's legs seemed to give her trouble; she staggered more than walked down the stone stairs to the Common Room, where she slumped down on the day bed. She read the leader article, she read the sidebars (including the same interview with Harry that had appeared in the Quibbler four months ago). She read everything three times, then let the newspaper slip out of her hands onto the floor. She spent the next hour curled up in a fetal ball on the day bed, whimpering to herself. Finally, Marietta came down and, ignoring the sniggers about her face, tried to get Cho to stand up.

"Come back up," she whispered. "You don't want to let them see you like this."

Cho allowed herself to be led upstairs, but she didn't really hear anything Marietta said. Her mind was filled with one thought:

It should have been me. I should have been there. I should have been with him--with them. I wanted to be in the battle. I wanted it so badly. I trained so hard this year for it, and, when it happened, I wasn't there. The one thing I really wanted this year, the only way to avenge Cedric, and they never thought of asking for my help--

because I didn't deserve to be there.

As soon as she was in the dorm she turned to her desk, pulled out parchment and a quill, and wrote one sentence:

Mummy, I want to come home

She couldn't keep the tears in after that. She dashed from her desk to her bed, crawled in, shut the curtains, and only then hurriedly took off her robes, ripping them in the process. She didn't care. They hung on her skin like fire. She tossed them on the foot of her bed, buried her face in her pillow, and cried long and sorrowfully. She didn't answer Marietta until almost sundown.

Cho Chang didn't leave the dormitory, nor did she eat, for two days.

xxx

to be continued in part 31, wherein Cho, on the anniversary of Cedric's death, finds comfort from the least likely source ... 


	7. Chapter 31 Unexpected

OR DIE TRYING: CHO CHANG'S SIXTH YEAR

By monkeymouse

NB: JKRowling built the Potterverse; I'm just redecorating one of the rooms. And one of the great things about JKR telling the story from Harry's point of view is that stuff could be happening all over Hogwarts that Harry isn't aware of.

Rated: PG

Spoilers: Everything

xxx

31. Unexpected

Cho was in the library at Hogwarts. The June sun shone brightly in through every window, muted by panels of stained glass. The effect was like walking through a shaded grove, and, as fond of reading as she was, Cho felt sleepy. She felt her eyes getting heavy...

The crash of a slamming door echoed through the library. Cho was in the back, in the maze of stacks. She didn't know how she knew, but she sensed danger. She started running first up one aisle, then down another. She had no idea what she was running from, but she knew she had to run. She didn't see a single other student as she ran, but this was no surprise in high summer.

She had gone through the Restricted section, turned a corner--and there he was. The vagrant Muggle who had tried to assault her in the British Museum all those years ago. Except now, instead of layers of rags to protect him from the winter chill, he was stripped to the waist. And she could clearly see a skull branded onto his left arm--with a large snake crawling out of the skull's mouth.

The Dark Mark.

"There are thousands of us all over England; millions of us all over the world," the vagrant said, in a sickening echo of Cho's words to him in the British Museum after she'd Petrified him. "You've been walking past us on the street all your life and never knew it. And once you're back on the street, you'll never know whom you'll be standing next to."

Cho turned to run, but the man leapt like a cat over her head, landing in front of her, blocking her way. He grabbed her shoulders, throwing her to the stone floor, then fell on top of her, pulling at Cho's robes. Cho couldn't get up, couldn't reach her wand, and the smell of the man made her want to vomit. Then came the pain between her legs, pain like a knife--

"STOP IT!"

Marietta pulled open Cho's bed curtains, holding her glowing wand. Cho was sitting up in bed, staring straight ahead, breathing as if she'd just run a mile. Marietta lightly touched Cho's shoulder. Cho turned, stared at Marietta for a second, then buried her face in her hands. After a minute, she sheepishly looked back at the Prefect: "Seems like old times."

"Has this been going on all the time I've been in the hospital wing?"

"About once a week, I suppose, although sometimes I wake up and I don't remember what dream was terrifying me."

"And this time?"

Again Cho stared straight ahead. "I remember all too well. Please don't make me tell you."

"Cho, listen, this is not the kind of thing you want to take for granted. If you can't sort this out, with or without my help, I have no choice but to take it to Pomfrey. She'll be able to recommend something once you get back to Diagon Alley."

"I know," Cho murmured.

"See you in the morning, then." Marietta closed the bed curtains.

xxx

That nightmare ended Cho's 48 hours staying in the dormitory. Between the Sunday of the surprising Daily Prophet headline and the following Tuesday, Dumbledore had returned as Headmaster, announcing that Dolores Jane Umbridge was relieved of command. "Not as relieved as the rest of us," quipped Diana Fairweather.

Cho was eating less than usual, which wasn't much on the best of days. With Marietta by her side, she would come very early or very late to meals, eat a few bites, and leave after five minutes. She was doing it to punish herself. Like countless women and girls before her, she believed that she had somehow brought on Michael Corner's rude behavior. Withholding food, and avoiding any place Michael might be, were the only remedies she could think of at first.

Marietta had her own idea as to why Cho was more pale, drawn, and nervous than usual. And one week before the return to London--June 25--her suspicions seemed to be confirmed. Dawn came that day out of a clear sky. As soon as the sun began to clear the horizon, Cho's bedcurtains opened. She looked around the dormitory; then her eyes widened with a kind of recognition. She went to her writing desk, jotted down some figures, then dressed and went down to an early breakfast, leaving Marietta to try to catch up.

"What's all that, then?" Jan asked, looking at Cho's desk. The parchment had these numbers:

60 x 24 x 365 525,600

It didn't take any of them long to realize what Cho had been counting.

Cedric Diggory had been dead for 525,600 minutes.

xxx

This being understood, Cho's dorm-mates avoided her more than usual during the morning. Even though Cho's spontaneous crying jags were now few and far between, and her nightmares tapered off to one a week, her reputation as a "human hosepipe" was still alive and well.

Cho had a quick, light breakfast, then went to a stretch of wall behind the greenhouses. Once, this wall was the gateway to a secret garden tended by Cedric Diggory. He had told Cho aboutit on the night of the Yule Ball; from that day until Cedric's death, they would often meet in the garden, away from the prying eyes and clicking tongues and limited notions of Hogwarts' students. They found joy and peace in the garden, which they planted as soon as the weather permitted.

Cho hadn't been back to the wall since Valentine's Day, when she stumbled through the driving rain only to find that the wall no longer opened. It didn't open today, either. She sat on the grass next to the wall, leaning her head against it, thinking again of the happiness she had known with Cedric--gone now and never to return. Her attempts at romance after Cedric had turned out more like curses. Harry may have been a brilliant wizard, and she had really tried to share his thoughts and sympathies, but his friends kept getting in the way. And Michael Corner--forget about him altogether!

By eleven o'clock the sun was high enough to have stolen away the shade the wall provided. Cho decided that she might as well go back up to her dorm and start backing. There was only one week left to the term, and there was nothing else to do. As she walked through the halls of Hogwarts, she saw only a few students, but many of them were clearly couples. walking, or talking in lowered voices. Had she and Cedric looked like that? She kept her eye on the stone floor until she reached the tapestry that hid the entrance to Ravenclaw, said the password ("hellebore"), touched the spine of her copy of the Analects of Confucius, walked through a Common Room where two or three students were dozing in the comfy chairs, and went up to her dormitory.

She pulled the empty trunk from under her bed and a suitcase out of her wardrobe. When she opened the suitcase, she caught a glimpse of a yellow piece of paper--and her heart turned to ice.

The letter.

Cedric's parents had come by on Christmas Eve, and Mrs. Diggory gaver Cho a letter Cedric had written during the last hours of his life. "He meant it for you," she had told Cho. That could only mean one thing. Cho and Cedric had argued that last afternoon about whether or not Cedric loved her enough to stand up to his parents and defend her. Cho had shoved the letter into the pocket of her dress robes. It was supposed to be at home in Diagon Alley, not here...

Cho couldn't open the letter at first, her hands trembled so. After a few deep breaths, and a sense that she was jumping off of a cliff, the opened the Hufflepuff-yellow envelope, took out the letter and read:

"Dear mum and dad,

I expect writing this letter will make me late for the banquet. It's awfully bad form, I know, and for that I apologise. But in some ways this is the hardest letter I've ever had to write. I have seldom gone against your wishes, so I need to explain myself very clearly now.

Silence is golden; dad, I can't remember how many times I've heard you say that. Lie low, keep your own counsel, and wait for things to sort themselves out. It's the best way to get ahead without risking too much. And it made perfect sense to me until last autumn. That was when Cho Chang, the Ravenclaw Seeker I introduced you to today, stopped me in the corridor. I could tell she was angry about something. She had seen those "Support Cedric Diggory" badges, which went on to say something rude about Harry Potter--you remember those badges, dad, you found them so funny. Well, Cho wasn't amused at all, and attacked me for making them; and then, when I told her that I wasn't responsible, she said I was just as guilty as the Slytherins who made them because I didn't do anything to try to stop them.

Her speech gave me a sleepless night, I can tell you, and I turned it over and over in my mind before I realized that, dad, you were wrong and Cho was right. If something wrong is happening, standing by and watching in silence doesn't make you safe or neutral. Anyone with any kind of conscience would step up and say, This is wrong. And it took a Fifth Year witch to tell me.

I realized something else that night: that I would be asking Cho to the Yule Ball. Since that night, it's a rare day that we haven't seen each other, and I've come to realize one other very important thing: that, even if it means being disinherited and losing the Diggory name, I can not and will not leave Hogwarts and go out into the wizarding world without Cho by my side..."

Cho dropped the letter as a wave of panic washed over and through her. The letter confirmed that Cedric had, in fact, not carried their quarrel over Cedric's parents to his grave. This news should have made Cho feel better, but, instead, it just made the intervening year seem longer, darker, more hopeless. It made Cedric Diggory seem deader than he already was.

Get out of the castle. That was all Cho could think to do at that moment: get away from the walls that close in on her every day and night, as if she also were in a tomb. She dashed down to the entrance to the castle, just as students were getting out of lunch. The hall was full of students milling about, some leaving the castle to get out into the June weather, others coming in, still others exiting the Great Hall.

Cho pushed her way through the crowd, even more distraught than she had been for days. She saw a sliver of green space ahead between the students. That had to be the lawn. She dove for it as if being chased by Hagrid's worst monsters--

and ended up, not outside on the lawn, but in the middle of a forest.

At first she thought she was going mad. How had she gotten here, apparently in the middle of the Dark Forest? And why could she still hear the chatter of students? She turned to look back, and realized the truth at once: she had entered classroom eleven, which was next to the main doors, and which had been enchanted to resemble the forest for the new Divination teacher.

Solving that mystery didn't change anything, though, and Cho felt that all that she'd done today was cement a reputation into place: the Mad Girl of Hogwarts. She hadn't wanted any of this to happen, and she had no idea what to do next.

A twig snapped behind her. She turned, and saw him. His long, straight platinum-blonde hair hung down past his shoulders, and gave him a superficial resemblance to Draco Malfoy. Except that Malfoy had a more pasty complexion, indicating a preference for the indoors that was unusual for a Seeker. But this face was tanned and weather-beaten, square-cut and ruggedly handsome, rather like the Durmstrang Champion's was last year. But the Durmstrang Champion's torso did not end halfway down, turning into the four legs of a palomino stallion.

This, then, was "Professor" Firenze, the centaur who had taken over for Trelawney after Umbridge had sacked her. Cho knew that it was rude to say nothing to the centaur, who was, after all, on the faculty. But she couldn't rise from where she had collapsed, and merely inclined her head.

Firenze looked at her with curiosity. "I do not know you," he said in a voice that sounded somehow distant, and like the wind.

Cho realized that she was expected to say something. "I do not study Divination, sir."

"Why not?"

Cho had answered the question several times in the past year, and the answer came almost mechanically, but still with bitterness in her voice. "Because it's rubbish."

Firenze tilted his head to one side, examining her as if she were the curious animal. "If you refer to crystal-gazing and such, I might agree with you." This was the last thing Cho expected to hear from a Divination professor. Before she could say anything, the centaur continued, "But you do not deny that the future may be forecast by reading signs in the heavens."

"No, I've studied Astronomy ..."

"Then, what," Firenze interrupted, "has caused your mistrust of Divination?"

"It didn't work," Cho said, determined to press on even though she could sense the tears starting, "the one time it needed to work. It didn't see that Cedric would die last year."

Again the centaur looked at Cho as if she were a not-quite-human curiosity. "Ah, the boy who was killed in the Tournament. Was he your mate?"

Cho looked as if she'd been slapped. "No! I mean, well, we hadn't quite decided ..." She suddenly wanted to reread Cedric's letter, which was on the floor of her dormitory. "Perhaps, if he had lived. Why does that matter?"

"It matters not at all to me. It is the only thing that matters to you. I am curious."

"Are you telling me that centaurs don't understand love at all?"

"There are many things that we do not understand as you humans do. While we can be killed or die, centaurs are virtually immortal. We use our centuries of life to study the cosmos, and the signs that are written there. We mate, and our mares foal, but only once in a century, if that. Our life-spans prevent us from understanding love as you do."

Cho hung her head; now that her panic attack was over, she was feeling exhausted. "Then you can't understand how I feel."

After a minute of silence, Firenze spoke: "Yes, it is about understanding, isn't it? I can help you understand, but you must follow my instructions."

Cho had more than a few doubts, but nobody else had offered to help her. "What should I do?" she asked as she started to rise.

"Do not stand. You must lie on the floor, face up." Cho did so. "Tell me what you see as you look up."

"The leaves on this tree I'm under. It's an elm tree."

"Look at the leaves, very carefully. They may seem identical, but each has minute differences that set them apart one from the other. One may suffer disease, another may be chewed by insects, but all of them are similar in most respects. They are born in the spring, they live through the summer, they wither and die in the autumn. And no oracle can tell with accuracy which leaf will first fall from the tree."

Cho tried to focus on the leaves, but wasn't sure if she was supposed to notice them individually or as a bunch.

"So it was with the boy who was killed. We knew that the war against Voldemort had not been won, but was merely paused. We knew that others would die before one side or another was victorious. But we could not specify who would fall, or when, or how.

"Look at the leaves, and try to see them as the tree sees them. Look with the eyes of a tree which lives, not a few months, but many decades and even centuries, and sees the world in a way that a leaf can never understand."

Cho tried to focus her mind on the leaves, but it grew harder and harder to keep them open. She still wasn't sure what Firenze was driving at--

xx

Ni hao, Cho Li.

Cho opened her eyes. She was in the churchyard in Ottery St. Catchpole, where Cedric was buried. Except that Cedric was sitting on his own tombstone, looking down at Cho, who was lying on his grave.

--Cedric!

It's been a long time.

--Well, I've been at Hogwarts ...

And wept for me nonstop, from what I hear.

--Well, what did you expect!

Cho Li, I never wanted to be remembered with tears. Didn't you smile even once thinking about our time together?

--I, I tried, Ced, honestly. But it hurt so much.

I didn't hurt you, did I?

--Not like that, but ...

Then you've spent this year hurting yourself ...

--Damn you, Cedric Diggory, why are you doing this to me!

The truth is, I've done nothing to you. Not a lot I can do, being stuck here. But what have you done to yourself?

--I didn't want this to happen!

What?

--Any of this! I didn't want to, to lose the Cup, or get in a fight with Harry, or be groped by Michael Corner, or have everyone make fun of Marietta who's the truest friend I still have! I wanted, well, I don't even know anymore!

Cho buried her face in her hands, sobbing.

Cho Li, you hate me, don't you?

--N-never.

Then you hate yourself. Not too many choices, after all.

--I ...

Listen, Cho Li. If I'd known that you'd spend all this time grieving for me, I'd have cut my own foot off and never taken you to the Yule Ball. Can't you remember me with happiness at all?

--There's just ... too much sadness mixed up with it.

Well, then, it's time for the happiness to take a turn. It's been rather cheated this year, don't you think?

--I, I don't even know if I can ...

I'm sure you can. You've done so much already.

--Well, I suppose. I ... Cedric, I can make a Patronus now!

Really? That's smashing!

--I wish you could see it. It's this big, beautiful swan ...

Good for you, then. I never could, but I wonder what mine would have been. Labrador retriever, I think, like the one I conjured up in the First Task. We used to have one around the place when I was a tyke. Big clumsy old thing, and he and I loved each other.

--I wish we could have talked like this more often this year.

We could have, you know, even up in Hogwarts.

--But, but how ...

Let's make that your homework for next time, then.

--Stop! I'm here now! Tell me the secret!

If you're here now, you already know the secret. Just remember. That's the secret. No mourning or wailing. Just remember.

The wind picked up, scattering dust and leaves into Cho's eyes, making it hard to see. She shielded her eyes, and when she dropped her hand ...

she was back in the enchanted classroom. The centaur was gone.

She had no idea how long she had been in there. She must have dozed off, because she dreamed about ... something. She couldn't catch it now.

Cho stood up, dusted off her robes, and left the classroom. As she stepped into the entryway, Marietta was coming in the main doors.

"There you are! We couldn't see where you'd run off to!" Marietta lowered her voice. "To tell the truth, I was terrified you'd done yourself a mischief. How are you feeling?"

Cho thought about it for a second, then answered truthfully. "I feel fine; quite fine."

In fact, even if she couldn't say it, she felt something she hadn't felt in over a year: peace.

And, though nobody noticed it at the time, she never again had another nightmare.

xxx

to be concluded in part 32, wherein Cho takes the Express back home and makes several important discoveries...

A/N: Some readers may recognize an allusion to a certain song from a certain Broadway musical. 


	8. Chapter 32 The Hippogriff in the Parlour

OR DIE TRYING: CHO CHANG'S SIXTH YEAR

By monkeymouse

NB: JKRowling built the Potterverse; I'm just redecorating one of the rooms. And one of the great things about JKR telling the story from Harry's point of view is that stuff could be happening all over Hogwarts that Harry isn't aware of.

Rated: PG

Spoilers: Everything

xxx

32. The Hippogriff in the Parlour

"Dear Mummy and Daddy,

As you can see, I've sent Quan Yin ahead with this note. It should be there when you wake. This is just to let you know that I feel..."

Cho had to break off writing. She thought and thought about what the past week had been like, ever since her encounter with Firenze. Not quite believing it herself, she continued:

"I feel fine. You can see that for yourselves when the Express gets back to King's Cross.

Former Headmistress Umbridge left us today. She'd been keeping a very low profile since the return of Albus Dumbledore, and I suspect she feared getting the reception she finally got. She tried to sneak out of Hogwarts while the rest of us were at lunch today, but the resident poltergeist, Peeves, wasn't about to let her get away easily and started pummeling her, and what started as a sneak turned into a run. The students all ran to watch, of course, and the faculty tried half-heartedly to restore order. I did, however, overhear Professor McGonagall tell another professor that she was sorry that Peeves was beating Umbridge with her best walking-stick. "I would like to have given Umbridge the send-off she truly deserves." We can talk about this further when I get home."

And when I can be sure the owls aren't being tampered with, Cho thought.

"The Leaving Feast only went to show that Dumbledore is once again in charge. Going by points, and the Slytherin Prefects' tendency to take points from every other House on the slightest pretext, Slytherin had been the clear winner of the House Cup going into the Feast. Then Dumbledore started adding back points to the other Houses for all sorts of reasons, until it was nearly a four-way tie. Then came the final blow, with Slytherin ahead of Gryffindor by thirty points. Referring to that enchanted swamp I wrote about, he said, "In my absence, the Fifth Floor has sprouted a little bit of wetlands. Professor Flitwick assures me that it was a very ingenious spell, which deserves twenty points." Then he deliberately paused a bit, and added, "For each of its creators."

There it was; Gryffindor got the House Cup yet again, and it was the Weasley twins who got it for them. The two greatest ne'er-do-wells I've ever met, and they get the Cup for the House they fled weeks ago. Dumbledore was being hopelessly partisan in favour of Gryffindor, again, but it's perfectly understandable to those of us who've been here all year.

I'll finish this now and turn to the little bit of packing I still have to do. See you tomorrow.

Love, Cho"

xxx

Cho put the quill and inkwell into her trunk, certain that she wouldn't need it again until she was home in Diagon Alley. She tied the scroll to her owl's leg; the owl immediately left through the open window and flew into the night.

She looked at the other girls in her dormitory; girls who, like her, were packing for the trip home the next day. Jan Nugginbridge had long since taken down her poster of the Weird Sisters, the band that had played at the Yule Ball. The poster had triggered a crisis in Cho her first night back, and Jan refused to take it down back then. It had come down sometime in the spring; Jan had simply grown tired of it. Now she was combing out her cat, Coriander.

Marietta was gloomy, talking to nobody, her face still a mass of blotches that spelled out the word "SNEAK." The other two, Raina al-Qaba and Diana Fairweather, glanced around the room even as they spelled their belongings into their trunks.

I know why it's like this, Cho thought. Dumbledore didn't say anything about it, but I know we're all thinking it: a war we thought had ended years ago has come back. Perhaps we won't all be back here in September. In the last war some families fled England, others fought and lost loved ones. It's strange that my family chose to come here from China, just before I was born, while the war was still on. Voldemort hadn't yet met Harry--

Harry.

This was the year that gave me what I wished for, Cho thought with a touch of bitterness, a touch of regret, and even a touch of joy. I got to know Harry Potter. And it was ... nice. That morning in the Owlery, anyway, when Harry finally got over his nerves and we could have a chat. The Army. The misteltoe... Then that business with Marietta's face; and if Granger still can't forgive Marietta, fine. I shan't forgive Granger.

She closed her trunk a bit loudly, got into bed and drew the curtains. If her mates saw her so angry, there'd only be awkward questions, and she didn't want that.

xxx

By the time Cho's bed curtains opened again, the sun was streaming in on a flawless summer day. She again wondered what might happen over the summer, who might not return...

Roger Davies, of course, would not return, because he'd done his seven years, completed his N.E.W.T.s and was set to go into the wizarding world, war or not. But he and Cho had already said their goodbyes, after a fashion, and it hadn't been very pleasant.

She watched the other girls dressing, packing the last few items, going to breakfast or returning from breakfast. Their lives are so much simpler than mine, she thought. This past year has been, well, parts have been good but most of it has been ghastly. Quidditch was good--all but the last match. But that gives me something to aim for next year. It'll be my Seventh, and I WILL bring the Quidditch Cup back to Ravenclaw! That and my N.E.W.T.s will be more than enough to get on with. Speaking of getting on, better have breakfast; there's nothing between here and Diagon Alley but the trolley, and that's never good enough...

xxx

Cho and Marietta were among the last to arrive on the platform, waiting for the Hogwarts Express. Marietta couldn't find anything suitable to cover her face. At the last moment, Cho got a woolen balaclava, in Ravenclaw colour stripes, out of Marietta's trunk. She tried to Transfigure it into silk, but it kept slipping out of place.

"Never mind about that," Marietta said sourly, as she Transfigured it back to wool. "Mum's sending me to St. Mungo's first thing tomorrow morning and letting them sort it out."

"Sending? Won't she be with you?"

The scarf muffled Marietta's reply as they walked down to leave for the summer. "She doesn't have the time now. Ever since the Ministry decided You-Know-Who is back, the Floo Network's been humming along nonstop. She says she spends most of her time sending panicky callers to Magical Law Enforcement; there's really nowhere else to send them yet. Fudge is trying to put together some sort of Death Eater Activities Division, but it's not off the ground yet..."

Cho was only listening to Marietta with one ear as they emerged onto the great stone steps, joining the trickle of last-minute students heading for the station. The day was deceptively beautiful, sunny and warm (too warm for a wool balaclava, but Marietta was more interested in being covered than in being cool).

They had been standing toward the back of a crowded platform, with just a few minutes before boarding, when Cho heard a voice behind her: "Cho, please don't walk away. I have to talk to you."

Michael Corner.

She had tried, very hard, to avoid him after their disastrous date. Her hand instinctively twitched toward her wand, but she decided not to do anything.

Marietta quickly said, "I'll be back in a minute," and stepped away before Cho could say anything.

"First of all," Michael said, "I am so very sorry about what I did. I've been trying to find you for three weeks now to apologise."

Cho stared straight ahead, not looking at him. "What you did, and what you said, won't go away with a simple 'I'm sorry.'"

"I ... Well ... Look here ..."

"What made you think that I wanted that!"

"You're not the first girl I've ever gone with, you know. Some of them, speaking frankly, didn't complain. But you'd shoved me, and, well, you hurt my pride more than anything else. I just felt I had to say something to hurt you."

"Congratulations, you succeeded."

"Will you listen, please? I was mad at you until the next day, when I realized something. I missed you. I missed those little chats we had during my O.W.L.s week. I don't know how you did it, but you became very important to me, and I didn't realize it until you were nowhere around. That's why I'm apologising: because I know that you didn't deserve to be treated that way."

Cho was still unsure whether to accept his apology, and said nothing.

"Cho, I just want to be able to send an owl or two over the summer to you. I'd like to keep in touch." This time, Cho turned to face him, eyes blazing. Michael held up his hands. "Sorry; poor choice of words. Fine, let's just leave friendship out of it. We're both still in the Army, you know, and there is a war on, and nobody knows what You-Know-Who will do in the next two months. Suppose Harry needs our help? We should be ready for that, at the very least."

Cho looked at the swarthy boy, who seemed so anxious to have her forgive him, and admitted to herself that she too had missed their conversations. She took a breath and said, "Well, on that basis..."

Michael's face lit up, not even waiting for her to finish. "That's super! Thanks, Cho, thanks a lot." A student shouted down the platform. "Oops, that's my mates. Gotta ride with them. Have a good summer!" And he vanished into the press of students.

A minute later, Marietta reappeared. "What was that all about?"

"He wanted me to forgive him."

"What cheek."

"And ... I think I did."

Marietta stared at Cho for a minute. "You still have a lot to learn about boys, then."

Cho sighed. "I was just thinking the same thing."

xxx

For the most part, the train ride was as uneventful as ever--eight hours of British countryside sliding past. Marietta sat next to the window looking out, which kept anyone in the corridor from seeing her face. Cho sat across from her, as if keeping watch. Occasionally, another Ravenclaw would come in to chat for a bit, but they never stayed long. Cho couldn't tell if it was her mournful reputation or Marietta's face that made them leave shortly after they arrived.

When Diana Fairweather came in, it was to tell them what had happened to Draco Malfoy and his two "shadows," Crabbe and Goyle. "Malfoy must have been half-mad to draw a wand on Potter like that. Anyway, a half-dozen students in the compartment see the whole thing, rush out and hex the three of them. Left them looking like something between a sausage and a slug."

"Any of us?" Cho asked.

"A couple of Fifth-Years, Boot and Goldstein. The rest were Hufflepuffs. Never would have thought they had it in them."

"There's bravery in numbers, I suppose," Cho said, not wanting to mention that they were probably all in Dumbledore's Army. She found herself envying them; they were doing something constructive, actually Defending Against the Dark Arts. Then her thoughts pulled her up short; be careful what you wish for, Cho Chang, because you may not end up facing some loutish Slytherin. It may be one of the Azkaban escapees, or some other Death Eater who's studied the darkest of the Dark Arts...

"Cho?"

Cho snapped out of her reverie when she realised Marietta was talking to her. "Sorry."

"Didn't mean to bring you back from whatever far-off place you were in, and you can go back there, but after you walk with me to the loo."

They walked down the corridor toward the girls' toilet, Cho not thinking about anything in particular. She glanced in one compartment, and stopped.

Harry.

Granger was with him, of course, and the two remaining Weasleys, Keeper Ron and Seeker Ginny, and Neville Longbottom, who she remembered from Dumbledore's Army. But she only thought about them later.

Harry had been playing chess with Ron, and had looked up for a second. In that second, their eyes met. Cho suddenly grabbed Marietta's wrist and pulled her along the corridor. Marietta started to say something, then stopped. She saw that Cho was blushing like a sunset.

Cho pulled Marietta into the waiting room outside of the girls' toilet and onto a bench next to her. Then Cho started to laugh.

It was literally the first time since the Tri-Wizard Tournament that Cho had laughed at anything at all. All Marietta could do was watch as Cho's laughter just went on and on.

After about a minute, Marietta tried to interrupt her. "What's wrong?"

Cho turned to her, still chuckling. "What's wrong is that I saw it, Marietta. I saw the hippogriff in the parlour."

Marietta just looked completely confused.

"You know how they say," Cho said, still chuckling from time to time, "when people are together and there's some embarrassing subject they just refuse to talk about, that it's like a hippogriff in the parlour? This large, moody, ferocious beast who could claw any of them to pieces, and they don't say a word about it, they just pretend it isn't there..."

Marietta's confusion had given way to worry. "Are you all right?"

Cho smiled at her Prefect, her friend; smiled sadly at her. "If you're wondering have I lost my mind, no, I haven't; just my heart. I looked at Harry just now, looked into those eyes, and all the old feelings just flooded back into me. I still love him, Marietta; after everything that happened this year, Merlin and Morgana help me, I'm still in love with Harry Potter."

Marietta let out her breath. "You realize, of course, that no good can come of this."

"If I could choose to walk away from him, from both the good moments and the bad moments, I certainly would. But I can't! One way or another, my life is caught up with his."

"I wouldn't say you're destined for anything of the kind with him."

"Next year, Marietta. Something will change next year."

They didn't say much for the rest of the trip. When the cart came around, Marietta bought half a dozen Chocolate Frogs and popped them in her mouth in short order. "My complexion can't get any worse than it is now, can it?" she half-smiled between bites.

xxx

When the Hogwarts Express got to King's Cross, Cho and Marietta waited until they were the last to leave the train. Cho wanted to wait until Harry was gone; Marietta until her mother came onto the platform.

"I'm sure your mother will get you taken care of in no time," Cho was saying. "She'll ..."

"She'll do nothing!" The wool wrappings only muffled her shouting a little bit. "I'll spend the summer in St. Mungo's, like I spent the spring in the hospital wing, and--"

"Stop that! I've had quite enough of my own tears this year; please don't add yours."

"Have you?"

"Have I what?"

"Had enough. About Cedric, I mean."

Cho bowed her head, thinking for a minute. "There'll probably never be enough. I'll remember Cedric until I die. But I don't have to go to pieces everytime I think of him."

Marietta mumbled something that was swallowed up in the balaclava. She tried again: "I saw you blush, when we saw Harry. You were ashamed of me, weren't you?"

"No, it's just--I don't understand him anymore. I want one conversation with him when we wouldn't start fighting again. Such a waste when I still--"

"Do you think Harry knows about Michael?"

"No." A minute's pause. "I don't know." Another pause. "I don't care."

"Is that so?"

"Oh look! That's your mother, isn't it?"

Marietta rushed into the arms of a tweedy, middle-aged witch who bundled her daughter off of the platform with barely a glance at Cho.

Cho waited a minute, to give the others a chance to be on their way, then passed through the barrier herself.

Harry was still there, having a conversation with--Cho could hardly believe it--Professors Lupin AND Moody. That explains his abilities, Cho thought. Harry Potter, I don't know what will happen tomorrow or the next day, but, whatever else may happen, you are the best Defense teacher I've ever had, and I'll believe that until my dying day.

Only now did she notice the witch standing with the Dark Arts professors. She looked like any of a thousand young people in London, with spiky pink hair and a t-shirt; except that this one said "The Weird Sisters."

Instinctively Cho braced herself for the feelings--the rush of emotion with a Cedric-related topic. She knew she would be reminded of the Yule Ball and of dancing in Cedric's arms--

and those memories came again, but the rush of emotion didn't. It was there, to be sure, but it didn't overwhelm her. For the first time, it was manageable.

The surprise of this made Cho lean against the track 10 side of the barrier. Was it over, then? she thought. Probably not. The feelings will still come unbidden, and may still conquer me--but it may not happen for another week, or another month. In the meantime, I can handle them. I can actually handle them.

She practically ran with her luggage cart into the station, where she saw both her parents waiting for her. She rolled up to them, beaming.

"Cho," her father began a bit nervously, "are you, I mean, how are you?"

"Much, much better," Cho smiled--a smile they hadn't seen in over a year. "Especially since we've lost that monster Umbridge!"

"Manners, Cho!" her mother scolded her.

"Whether I say it or not, she's still a beast. But I'll tell you about it on the way home."

Cho raced on ahead with her luggage, leaving a Chinese wizard and witch gazing after their impudent, headstrong, unpredictable seventeen year old daughter.

xxx

My deepest thanks to all the readers who have stuck with me this far. Will this continue? It all depends on what JKR puts into "Half-Blood Prince". As soon as I've read it and have a chance to think about the newest addition to Canon, I'll post something to let you know... 


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